International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development-– Volume 3 Issue 2, Mar-Apr 2020

Available at www.ijsred.com
RESEARCH ARTICLE OPEN ACCESS

Design of an Advanced Piezoelectric Footstep Power Generation

System.A Case Study of Must – Basement Room
Sospeter Gabriel
Department of Electrical and Power Engineering, Mbeya University of Science and Technology-Tanzania
[email protected]

Abstract:
Advanced piezoelectric footstep power generation system is a system concerned with generation of electric
power using piezoelectric sensors through footsteps. The designed system involved staircases of
Administration area at Mbeya University of Science and Technology (MUST) where workers and students
pass. When there is no supply power from TANESCO, some of the rooms especially basement Rooms which
are the main venue for some of the classes become out of use because of total darkness during a day time. The
purpose of the designed system was to change the mechanical energy produced by personnel through
movement into electrical energy that can be used to power the basement rooms at MUST. The number of
peoples who pass through the staircase per day was observed and the minimum number was taken for
analysis and design purpose. After design, the circuit was simulated in order to observe results. The circuit
was built and then tested where up to 12 Volts was produced. The output voltage can be stored using bank of
batteries. The designed circuit system will act as backup power for basement Rooms at Mbeya University of
Science and Technology when supply power from TANESCO is cut off.

Keywords: Footsteps, Piezoelectric, Energy conversion, Microcontroller, Battery Bank

I. INTRODUCTION peoples go and return through the stair cases.

Electricity is most commonly used energy source. While walking energy is wasted in the form of
Electricity can be generated from difference vibration to the surface. This wasted energy can be
resources like water, wind, solar, geothermal, tidal, converted into electricity using the principle called
natural gas etc. To generate the electricity from piezoelectric effect.
these resources, development of big plants are Piezoelectric effect is the effect in which
needed having high maintenance cost and some mechanical vibrations; pressure or strain applied to
cause high pollution. Most of the buildings at piezoelectric material is converted into electrical
MUST are having the Basements Rooms which are form by using Piezo-electric materials such as
used as class rooms and some as staff offices. quartz, Lead Zirconate Titanate (PZT),
There has been several power outage from the Polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF), Rochelle salt,
supply authority during the working hours which Mica etc. From literature survey it is evident that,
lead to total darkness on the basement rooms and piezoelectric material (PZT) is superior in
hence stoppage of all activities. MUST as an characteristics and series-parallel combination is
academic institution, at its main campus is having found to be more suitable. .
5,482 students and around 500 staff [1]. At the The efficiency of the system can also be increased
stair cases of Administration area the average steps by using Prieto battery (rechargeable battery made
of 13000 up to 15000 steps was observed per day of nanotechnology) and voltage can be effectively
during the period of study by counting number of increased by using boost converter. By using

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 International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development-– Volume 3 Issue 2, Mar-Apr 2020
Available at www.ijsred.com
synthesized piezoelectric crystals and better
selection of place of installation more electricity
can be generated. Utilization of waste energy of
foot power with human locomotion is very much
relevant and important for highly populated places
like the roads, railway stations; bus stands,
colleges, universities, temples, etc. are all over
crowded of people move around the clock.
The main objective of this research paper is to Figure 1: Array Sensors

design and develop the model of advanced piezo-

B. Liquid Crystal Display (LCD)
electric footsteps power generation system. In
order to accomplish the main objective the A Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) is an
following are the specific objectives: electronically-modulated optical device shaped
• To study the existing system for advanced into a thin flat panel made up of any number of
piezo-electric footsteps power generation color or monochrome pixels filled with liquid
system. crystals and arrayed in front of a light source
• To design the proposed circuit for advanced (backlight) or reflector [2]. It is often utilized in
piezo-electric footsteps power generation battery-powered electronic devices because it uses
system very small amounts of electric power. LCD has
material which combines the properties of both
liquids and crystals. Rather than having a melting
point, they have a temperature range within which
II. LITERATURE REVIEW the molecules are almost as mobile as they would
Piezoelectric crystal is the way of generating be in a liquid, but are grouped [3]. Figure 2
electricity by using human footsteps. Key concept indicate the LCD used together with piezoelectric
of working of this system is capturing the plate.
mechanical energy produced by human being
through movements and converting it into
electrical energy. The piezoelectric placed under
insulating material like hard rubber and pressure
created by foot step will produce electrical energy
which can be stored and used to power the
basement rooms devices like lamps, computers etc.
Figure 2: Liquid crystal Display
A. Array Sensor (Piezo Electric Plate)
Piezoelectric Material has a crystalline structure; it
has ability to convert mechanical strain to
electrical energy. It belongs to the group of C. Arduino UNO Microcontroller
ferroelectric material. The most available
piezoelectric materials are PVDF and PZT. For Arduino is an open-source platform used for
getting better output voltage for various pressure it building electronics projects. Arduino consists of
is important to select the best piezoelectric both a physical programmable circuit board (often
material. As we apply various pressure applied to referred to as a microcontroller) and a piece of
the piezoelectric material the different voltage software, or IDE (Integrated Development
readings corresponding to the force is displayed. Environment) that runs on the computer, used to
The array sensor is as shown in figure 1 write and upload computer code to the physical

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 International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development-– Volume 3 Issue 2, Mar-Apr 2020
Available at www.ijsred.com
board [4]. Unlike most previous programmable
circuit boards, the Arduino does not need a
separate piece of hardware (called a programmer)
in order to load new code onto the board – you can
simply use a USB cable. Additionally, the Arduino
IDE uses a simplified version of C++, making it
easier to learn to program [5]. Figure 3: shows
Figure 4: Transformer
Arduino UNO Microcontroller
F. Filter Capacitor
It is a passive two-terminal electrical component
used to store energy electro statically in an electric
field [7]. It used to removes ripples from pulsating
DC voltage by shorting to the ground AC signals
and allowing DC signals to flow to the regulator
Figure 3: Arduino UNO Microcontroller for further process. The forms of practical
capacitors vary widely, but all contain at least two
electrical conductors (plates) separated by a
D. Microcontroller Applications
dielectric (i.e. insulator). The conductors can be
Microcontrollers are intended for embedded thin films, foils or conductive electrolyte, etc. A
devices, in comparison to the micro-processors dielectric can be glass, ceramic, plastic film, air,
which are used in PCs or other all-purpose devices. vacuums, paper, and mica. The non-conducting
Microcontrollers are employed in automatically dielectric acts to increase the capacitor's charge
managed inventions and appliances like- power capacity. An ideal capacitor does not dissipate
tools, implantable medical devices, automobile energy but stores in the form of an electrostatic
engine control systems, office machines, remote field between its plates
controls appliances, toys and many more
embedded systems. By dipping the size and The capacitor used for filter is shown in figure 5
expenditure in comparison to a design that make
use of a different micro-processor, I/O devices and
memory, micro-controllers formulate it
inexpensive to digitally control more & more
appliances and operations. Mixed signal micro-
controllers are general; putting together analog
Figure 5: Capacitor
constituents required controlling non-digital
electronic structures.
G. Inverter
An inverter is an electronic device that converts the
E. Step Down Transformer
direct current (DC) into alternating current (AC).
Step down transformer is used to step down ac
Operation of inverter depends on the power
voltage from main supply into 12V voltage [6] to provided by the battery during the runtime. The
inverter of 1500 W was proposed to carry the
the value that is suitable to be fed to the rectifier
estimated load at the Basement Room.
for the further process. The ideal transformer is
shown in figure 4

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 International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development-– Volume 3 Issue 2, Mar-Apr 2020
Available at www.ijsred.com
III. METHODOLOGY 02 Project EB-W05 1 2 282
For successful completion of this research, various or Epson 8
of methods were adopted, these methods includes 2
data collection, data analysis 03 Lamps LED 31 1 496
6
A. Data Collection Tube light 11 3 396
This concerned with gathering data which 6
facilitated the accomplishment of the project. The Energy saver 4 1 44
data collected are very important as far as 1
designing and implementation of the system is Grand Total 1263
concerned. Source; Must 2019
B. Data Analysis The population of MUST staff and students were
The data collected are mathematically analyzed in obtained from human Resource and Admission
order to obtain the useful behaviors that are helpful offices respectively as shown on Table 2.
for the design.
Table 2 Admission and Human Resource Office
C. Designing Circuit and Simulation Data
After the designing the system, proteus software
was used to simulate the circuit.
S/No Category Sub-total
IV. DATA PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS
AND DISSCUSSION OF THE 01 Employed staff 504
RESULTS
Data were collected from the pilot Basement Room 02 Students 5482
on its estimated electrical power consumption,
population of MUST population (staff and Total 5986
students) and physical counting of personnel’s who
pass through the proposed area of administration Source; Must 2019
block Data was also collected through counting the
The data was collected from MUST Basement physical population of people who pass in average
Room used as class room for teaching purpose. through the stairs at MUST Administration area
The aim was to know the power consumption of are as shown in Table 3
Basement’s used equipments and devices together
with the lightings. The collected data are as
recorded in table 1. Table 3 Average Counted Population at
Administration Area
Table 1Power consumptions of Basement’s equipments

S/No Duration Number of people

Equipment

Power(W)

power(W)
Quantity

Morning 2026
Model

Total

Afternoon 1205
01 Laptop Hp ProBook 1 4 45
430 5

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 International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development-– Volume 3 Issue 2, Mar-Apr 2020
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Evening 987

Night 754

Average total number 4972

of people/day
Source; Must 2019
A. Power Generated
The maximum voltage is generated when
maximum force or weight is applied to
piezoelectric materials [8]. Pressure provided to
piezoelectric materials is directly proportional to
amount of power generated. According to [9] piezo
sensor can generate 1 V (minimum) and 10 V
(maximum) per step. Considering the minimum
value, 9600 steps are required to increase 12 V in a Figure 7: Prototype of Piezoelectric Footstep
battery. According to the data collected as shown Power Generation
on table 3, during the morning in the area proposed C. Circuit Operation
which has six stairs there are about 12,156 steps When force applied to piezoelectric transducer it is
which are enough to produce the required voltage. converted into electrical energy. A rectifier
controls the fluctuation in generated voltages and
unidirectional current controller controls the
B. Circuit Diagram battery charging current with the help of
The circuit diagram for generation of Electricity microcontroller. The voltage generated by series of
using piezo electrical materials was designed. The sensors is stored in Lead Acid batteries. This
circuit diagram is as shown in figure 6 and the voltage can be used to drive either DC or AC
designed prototype is also shown in figure 7. loads. For AC loads, pure sine wave inverter
circuit is used. Inverter converts dc voltages stored
in lead acid batteries into 220 Volt AC. AC
voltages can be used to drive AC loads. Rating of
battery charger depends on amount of power
generation from foot step. The generated voltage
from the footsteps is displayed on the LCD.

D. Conclusion
Advanced piezoelectric footsteps power generation
system is a system designed for the purpose of
generating power through the use of footsteps of
people at Mbeya University of Science and
Technology. The researcher aimed to solve the
problem of electric power supply at University
Figure 6: Designed circuit diagram Basement Rooms when the supply from
TANESCO is cut off. The designed system can be
used to other different places having crowd
movement.

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 International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development-– Volume 3 Issue 2, Mar-Apr 2020
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