Router for Wireless Power Packet Transmission: Design and Application to Intersystem Power Management

Power supply for small-scale battery-powered systems, such as electric vehicles and mobile robots, is being actively researched. The authors are particularly interested in energy management, which considers the interconnection of such systems close to each other. This allows for overall redundancy to be maintained without assuming excessive redundancy with individual power sources. Its implementation necessitates a high level of integration between power management and information and communication technology. As one of these methods, this study investigates energy management based on power packetization. When the individual systems to be connected have moving parts or are mobile, wireless power transmission is a promising method for power sharing. However, power packetization has so far only been considered for wired transmission. In this article, the authors address the integration of power and information in wireless channels using power packetization. A power packet router circuit is proposed for the wireless transmission of power over multiple channels selectively. Furthermore, the authors demonstrate that the developed system can handle both wired intrasystem power management and wireless intersystem power sharing in a unified manner.