Biodegradable materials in acoustic energy harvesting with triboelectric nanogenerator

Abstract

The growing global demand for energy requires sustainable and renewable energy alternatives to fossil fuels. This study investigates acoustic energy harvesting using a triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) fabricated from biodegradable materials. TENG has shown encouraging results in harvesting mechanical energy to electricity even with low- powered energies. Acoustic energy is considered as low-powered energy and has low energy density, making its conversion into usable electricity challenging. Nevertheless, acoustic energy remains ubiquitous and presents potential to act as renewable energy source.

TENG operates through triboelectrification and electrostatic induction. Phenomena is based on contact and separation, where two materials with different electron affinities generate charge. In this work, biodegradable polylactic acid (PLA) and cellulose acetate (CA) films of varying thicknesses were examined through this phenomenon. Thicknesses were characterized using a texture analyzer with an oscilloscope to evaluate the influence on energy output. The optimal pair produced 7.7 V under texture analyzer test conditions. Using the same material thicknesses, acoustic energy harvesting yielded a maximum of 1 V at 123 Hz. The level of voltage output is almost sufficient for sustaining microchips and tiny electronics such as sensors.

The results indicate that further optimization of the setup and material surface modifications could significantly improve the total energy output of TENG. This study highlights the potential of novel biodegradable material pair working in acoustic energy harvesting. Also, acoustic energy harvesting is evaluated in developing self-sufficient energy solutions for low-power electronics and sensor systems.