A micro Tesla turbine for power generation from low pressure heads and evaporation driven flows

We report on the design, fabrication and testing of a low pressure head Tesla microturbine. We began developing this technology as a means of scavenging energy from fluids flows induced in plant-like evaporative systems. Unlike traditional inertial turbines, Tesla turbines have high efficiency when driven with low pressure flows, are relatively simple to manufacture and scale down very favorably. The 1 cm3 rotor diameter turbine presented here is, to our knowledge, the smallest Tesla turbine reported, with an unloaded peak power of 45 mW (12 cc/sec flow, 17% efficiency) and a peak efficiency of 40% (< 2 cc/sec flow). Moreover, the entire turbine is built using a variety of modern commercial rapid prototyping methods, making its construction accessible to almost anyone. Beyond applications in evaporative scavenging, Tesla microturbines may find use as components in ultrasmall-profile heat engines and for energy generation from sources of low pressure head flow.