Exploring the Dynamics of Wind Energy Harvesters: VIV Turbines and Piezoelectrics

Resumo

Wind energy is recognized not only for its high generating capacity among renewable sources, but also for its growing popularity in recent years. However, conventional wind turbines, which rely on blades to capture wind energy, present significant challenges, including noise pollution, interference with bird migration and the frequent need for maintenance due to the complexity of their mechanical components. In an attempt to minimize these problems, current innovations include bladeless wind turbines (VBWT). These operate from wind-induced vibrations, mostly vortex-induced vibrations (VIV). Among the various designs that have been documented, those that exploit energy generation through electromagnetic induction and piezoelectric systems deserve to be highlighted, as they have gained increasing recognition in the academic sphere. In this context, this work focuses on carrying out a dynamic analysis of a vortex-induced vibration energy harvester (VIVEH), which will have its energy generated from a piezoelectric patch connected to a beam with non-linear stiffness due to a magnetic coupling. The system will have its equations of motion simulated using a Runge-Kutta integrator implemented in the Python programming language, where its responses will be analyzed in the time domain by studying the system's sensitivity to different wind speeds, and in the frequency domain using tools such as Fast Fourier Transforms (FFT) and Continuous Wavelet Transforms (CWT). The results focus on analyzing the influence of the beam's non-linearity and its response in the frequency and time domain for different wind speeds.