A New Receiver Detection and Fast System Activation Method for Wireless Power Transfer

Fast automatic identification of the presence of a WPT receiver is critically important for the future deployment of dynamic wireless power transfer devices of high efficiency and low cost. This article presents a new receiver identification and fast transmitter activation approach for wireless power transfer systems without using additional sensors or data communication. The wireless charging request is initiated by the WPT receiver through the WPT link, while the WPT transmitter stays idle without any significant power consumption until a receiver is present. Furthermore, the proposed WPT architecture can be based on a universal WPT block that can act as a transmitter, a receiver, or a repeater, which can potentially lead to more flexible and practical WPT systems. The proposed method can be applied in many use cases such as wireless charging of industrial robots and drones, among other potential applications. The proposed method is validated in an example WPT system using simulations. The process of detecting the receiver and activating the transmitters takes less than 300 µs.