Implementation of Piezoelectric Generator for Harvesting Energy for Different Types of Staircases with Automatic Switching Mechanism

As renewable energy source becomes more distinct and reliable these days especially in this modern era of new and environmental-friendly energy sources, a new design of a renewable energy system using piezoelectric transducers is implemented. Piezoelectric transducers are materials that could transform mechanical energy to electrical energy, in this case, the design has the sole purpose of harvesting electrical energy from human footsteps in a standalone mounted staircase. In this paper, 3 different locations are introduced as the basis for modelling of the system with the height of the staircase, density of steps and location as modelling parameters. A combination of the LTC3588-1 and a XLC6009 boost converter is used as charging circuit for the lead-acid battery. Furthermore, a relay and inverter based automatic transfer switch between battery and mains are designed and optimized to act as a simple and cheap uninterruptable power supply. With the use of data logger, the system recorded an output voltage that varies with the parameters discussed when a footstep is subjected.