RF-Based Energy Transfer Through Packets: Still a Dream? or a Dream Come True?

Limitations in battery capacity has held back the active development of novel applications for the Internet of Things (IoT) or have caused embedded systems researchers to design a number of “go-around” schemes, which sacrifice various system performance metrics for energy efficiency. However, with the concept of simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT), many researchers accept it as a potential technology that can be the basis of designing various next-generation low-power embedded computing systems. This work presents an experimental validation on RF-based SWIPT techniques. Specifically, using the Powercast P2110 Powerharvester Receiver, we evaluate its potential of being applied to various low-power embedded applications. We analyze the performance of these commercially available energy harvesting RF receivers in packet-based networks to show that energy harvesting in such cases are only possible with packets of long lengths in practical environments. Furthermore, we experimentally show that despite carrying energy, external noise factors on the wireless channel can deteriorate the RF-based energy harvesting performance due to high voltage amplitude fluctuations. Based on such observations, we present a set of system-level suggestions for future SWIPT-based system development.