Pyroelectric generators to harvest energy from disc brake pads for wireless sensors in electric vehicles

Abstract

There is a large amount of thermal energy wasted during the driving cycle of all kinds of vehicles. In this paper, a pyroelectric harvester system, based on temperature change, is designed for low-powered sensors for the reliable electronic/electric architecture development of autonomous vehicles. In fact, this harvester was designed, specifically, in order to capture the temperature of the braking system and convert the wasted heat energy during the contact process to electrical energy. This conversion process occurs due to the temperature variation through the pyroelectric material, given the cooling phenomena of the ambient air. The energy potentially available in the form of heat produced by the friction involved in braking was evaluated using finite element analysis in the multiphysics software environment. Therefore, we present simulations of disc heating and cooling during the braking process at different speeds. Moreover, the potential for energy harvesting in multiple rolling conditions is discussed, such as the braking cycles and the effect of the material thickness used in the conversion module. The proposed system has undergone simulation analysis, which shows that the system can generate a voltage of 10.8 V and a power of 7.0 mW for a cycle of one braking process and around 9.5 mW for a cycle containing two successive braking's. The results of the simulation study verify the feasibility of the system and demonstrate its pertinence, especially for low-power sensors for new vehicle generations.