Piezoelectric power generation for civil infrastructure systems

Civil infrastructure systems (CIS) employ various small electronic components ranging from temperature and humidity sensors used in buildings to acoustics emission sensors used for damage detection in bridges. Other than solar energy that has already found several applications in CIS; moving loads, surface strain fluctuations, and wind energy available in the vicinity of CIS constitute important sources of energy that can be converted into electricity. This paper focuses on low power generation from these energy sources using piezoelectric transduction. Moving loads caused by travelling vehicles can be used for exciting piezoceramics located on the road. Structural vibrations resulting from various sources such as support motions and interaction of CIS with the surrounding fluid may yield local surface strain fluctuations. Wind energy is available not only due to regular atmospheric flow but also due to the motion of vehicles travelling at relatively high speeds. This paper investigates and formulates (1) the electromechanical moving load problem for slender bridges with a piezoelectric cantilever and with embedded piezoceramics, (2) the problem of piezoelectric power generation from surface strain fluctuations using a piezoceramic patch, and (3) piezoelectric energy harvesting from wind excitation through aeroelastic flutter.