Windmill-inspired hybridized triboelectric nanogenerators integrated with power management circuit for harvesting wind and acoustic energy

Energy harvesting technology of converting ambient mechanical energies such as wind and acoustic wave into electricity is regarded as a potential solution for the sustainable development of society. Yet, efficiently extracting wind energy and acoustic energy still have room to be improved. In this paper, windmill-inspired hybridized triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) have been implemented to capture wind energy and acoustic energy simultaneously. The sound-driven TENG (S-TENG) was based on two conductive fabrics layers sandwiched electrospun P(VDF-TrFE) nanofibers, in which one conductive fabrics electrode was shared by the wind-driven TENG (W-TENG) and S-TENG. The unique structure design enables the W-TENG to enhance the electrical output of the S-TENG, which was analyzed and verified from Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) of electric signals. The output performance of the as-fabricated hybridized TENGs triggered by wind and acoustic wave was systematically investigated. The W-TENG can deliver a maximum open-circuit voltage (Voc) of 530 V and short-circuit current (Isc) of 10.5 μA at 10 m/s wind speed, with the optimized peak power of about 1.5 mW. While the corresponding electrical outputs of S-TENG are 80 V and 19 μA and 0.5 mW under a 180 Hz sound frequency and a 115 dB sound pressure. Furthermore, a specifically designed buck-boost topology power management circuit was integrated with the hybridized TENGs to enhance the amount of extracted energy. Thus, two digital temperature-humidity meters were successfully driven by the power-managed hybridized TENGs at the same time as the demonstrated applications. This work not only offers a facile approach to harvest ambient energy of wind and acoustic wave, but also effectively manages the output energy toward sustainable and clean energy practical applications.