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IFAC PapersOnLine 55-27 (2022) 224–229
Enhanced Charging Energy Efficiency via
Enhanced
OptimisedCharging Energy Efficiency
Phase of Directly Charging via
an
Enhanced
Enhanced
Optimised Charging
Charging
Phase of Energy
Energy
Directly Efficiency
Efficiency
Charging via
via
Enhanced Charging
EnergyPhase
Optimised Storage of
Energy
Capacitor
Directly by an an
Efficiency
Charging
via
Optimised
Optimised Phase
EnergyPhase Storage
Energy
of Directly
Capacitor
of Harvester
Directly by an an
Charging
Charging an
an
Energy
Energy Storage
Storage Capacitor
Capacitor by
by an
an
EnergyEnergyStorageHarvester
Capacitor by an
Energy
Energy
Zheng Jun Harvester
Harvester
Chew, Meiling Zhu
Energy Harvester
Zheng
Zheng Jun Jun Chew,
Chew, Meiling
Meiling Zhu Zhu
Zheng
Zheng Jun
Jun Chew,
Chew, Meiling
Meiling Zhu
University of Exeter, ZhengCollege
Jun Chew, Meiling Zhu
of Engineering, Zhu Mathematics and
PhysicalUniversity
Sciences,
University of
of Exeter,
EX4 4QF
Exeter, College
Exeter
College of
of Engineering, Mathematics
Mathematics and
UK (e-mail: m.zhu@exeter.ac.uk).
Engineering, and
Physical
PhysicalUniversity
Sciences,
University
Sciences, of
of Exeter,
EX4
Exeter,
EX4 4QF College
4QF Exeter
College
Exeterof
of Engineering,
UK (e-mail:
Engineering, Mathematics
m.zhu@exeter.ac.uk).
Mathematics
UK (e-mail: m.zhu@exeter.ac.uk). and
and
University
Physical Sciences,
Sciences, EX4of Exeter,
EX4 4QF College
4QF Exeter of
Exeter UK Engineering,
UK (e-mail: Mathematics
(e-mail: m.zhu@exeter.ac.uk).
m.zhu@exeter.ac.uk). and
Physical
Physical Sciences, EX4 4QF Exeter UK (e-mail: m.zhu@exeter.ac.uk).
Abstract: This paper presents a technique to enhance the charging time and efficiency of an energy
storage capacitor
Abstract:
Abstract: This paper
This paper presents
directlyaa charged
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technique to
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anenhance the charging
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Abstract:
storage This paper
capacitor
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to an
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harvester,
capacitor
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the energy
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energy
efficiency
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circuit voltage (V OC) of the energy harvester. The proposed OC method charges the capacitor from the energy
harvester
to an directly
an equivalent until
charging the capacitor voltage
over reaches 0.75V of
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which corresponds
harvester
is
to
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thanuntil
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efficiency
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A analysis.
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RC high-
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0.75V
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built A
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tested withfaster
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©Boost
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andThe aa final
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Authors.capacitor
energy
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The 317%
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CC BY-NC-ND
achieved an
an boosting
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charging
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Keywords:
over 91% faster
faster converter,
and
and a final
aa final capacitor,
capacitor
capacitor cold
voltage
voltage start-up,
of
of 317%
317% direct
higher
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boosting
boosting scheme.
scheme.
(https://creativecommons.org
over 91% faster and final /licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)
capacitor voltage of 317% higher than conventional boosting scheme.
Keywords: Boost
Keywords: Boost converter,
converter, capacitor,
capacitor, cold cold start-up,
start-up, direct
direct charging,
charging, energy energy harvesting.
harvesting.
Keywords: Boost
Keywords: Boost converter,
converter, capacitor,
capacitor, cold cold start-up,
start-up, direct
direct charging,
charging, energy energy harvesting.
harvesting.
Keywords: Boost converter, capacitor, cold start-up, direct charging, circuit,
management energy harvesting.
which includes the functions such as
1. INTRODUCTION management circuit,conversion,
which includes the functions such as
rectification, dc–dc and maximum power point
1.
1. INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION management circuit, which includes
includes the functions
functions such as
The widespread deployment 1. INTRODUCTION rectification,
tracking (MPPT) dc–dc
of low power wireless sensors management circuit, which includes the functions such as
management circuit,is conversion,
which
necessary toand maximum
the
manipulate power
the suchpoint
harvested as
1.
1. INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION rectification, dc–dc conversion, and maximum power point
The
has
Thebeen widespread
identified
widespread deployment
as a key enabler
deployment of
of low lowofpower wireless
wireless sensors
the development
power tracking
rectification,
energy (MPPT)
into dc–dc
a form is necessary
conversion,
that is
of the rectification, dc–dc conversion, and maximum power point
sensors to
usableandmanipulate
bymaximum
the the
wirelessharvested
power point
sensor
The widespread tracking (MPPT) is necessary to manipulate the harvested
has
The
Internet
has
The been
widespread
been of Thingsdeployment
identified
identified
widespread as aa key
deployment
(IoT).
as
deployment keyThese of
enabler
of
enabler
of
low
low ofpower
wireless
low of thesensor
power
the
power
wireless
development
wireless
systems
development
wireless
sensors
sensors
of the
sensors
tracking
systems
the energy
offind tracking (MPPT)
(Chew,
into
(MPPT) a form is
Ruan,
is necessary
that and
necessaryis usableto
to manipulate
Zhu, by2019).
manipulate the
In harvested
the batteryless
the wireless sensor
harvested
has
Internet been ofidentified
Things as a
(IoT). key enabler
These of
wireless the development
sensor systems of the
find energy
energy
systems,
systems into
into
the
(Chew, a
a form
form
circuits that
that
need
Ruan, tois
is
and usable
usable
operate
Zhu, by
by
solely the
the
2019). from wireless
wireless
Inthe sensor
sensor
output
batteryless of
has
has been
applications
Internet been ofidentified
identified as
in monitoring
Things as aa key
(IoT). key enabler
enabler orof
civilwireless
These of the
industrial
the development
sensor systemsof
environments
development of the
find
the energy into a form that andis usable by the wireless sensor
Internet
applications of Things
in (IoT).
monitoring These
civil wireless
or sensor
industrial systems
environments find systems
systems
the energy
systems, (Chew,
(Chew,
theharvester,
circuits Ruan,
Ruan,which
need and
to couldZhu,
Zhu,
operate be 2019).
2019).
low
solely voltage
from In
Inthe batteryless
batteryless
due to
output their
of
Internet
where
applications
Internet of Things
theofdata
Things (IoT).
in collected
(IoT).allows
monitoring These wireless
civilinformed
These or industrial
wireless sensor
decision
sensor systems find
makingfind
environments
systems on systems (Chew, Ruan, and Zhu, 2019). In batteryless
applications in collected
monitoring civilinformed
or industrial
industrial environments systems,
systems, the
the circuits
circuits need to operate solely from thedueoutput of
where
where the
applications
critical
applications data
theevents
data in
in such asallows
monitoring
collected
monitoring civil or
maintenance-scheduling
allows
civil informed
or industrialdecision
decision making
environments
(Bogue,
making
environments on the
on intrinsic
energy
systems,
the energy the circuits need
behaviours
harvester,
harvester,
which
need
which
to
for devicesoperate
to could
operate
could
be
be
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such
solely
low
from
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strongly
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to
of
to their
of
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where
critical
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2010). the
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collected
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such asallowsasallows informed
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conventional informed
method
maintenance-scheduling decision
decision
of using making
(Bogue,
making
batteries
(Bogue, on
on the
the energy
piezoelectric
intrinsic
energy harvester,
transducers
behaviours
harvester, which
for
which at could
resonance
devices
could be
such
be low
low voltage
(Kuang
asvoltage et
strongly due
al.,
due to
to their
2021),
coupled
their
where data collected informed decision making on intrinsic behaviours for devices such as strongly
et al.,coupled
critical
2010).
critical
to
2010). power
critical
events
However,
events
the sensors
However,
events
such
the
such
such
as
the isconventional
as maintenance-scheduling
method
as maintenance-scheduling
unappealing
conventional as the need
method
maintenance-scheduling of
of using
using (Bogue,the piezoelectric
batteries
(Bogue,
to replace
batteries
(Bogue,
intrinsic
solar
intrinsic cells transducers
behaviours
(Cabello
behaviours for at al.,
resonance
foretdevices
devices such (Kuang
such
2020), as
asandstrongly
strongly 2021),
coupled
thermoelectric
coupled
2010).
to
2010).
to
2010). power
batteries
power However,
the sensors
However,
the
However,
the
sensors
regularly the conventional
isconventional
incurs
the is unappealing
high maintenance
unappealing
conventional
method
as the
method
as
methodthe need of
need
of using
to replace
using
ofcosts,
to
using replace the piezoelectric transducers at resonance (Kuang et al., 2021),
batteries
batteries
especially
the
batteries
piezoelectric
solar cells
piezoelectric
generators transducers
(Cabello
transducers
(Chen, Su,et at
at resonance
al., 2020),
resonance
and Fan, (Kuang
and
(Kuang
2018). et
et
Theal.,
thermoelectric
al., 2021),
power
2021),
to power
batteries the sensors is unappealing as the need to replace the solar
generators
solar
management cells
cells (Cabello
(Chen,
(Cabello
circuits Su,et
et
usuallyal.,
and
al., 2020),
Fan,
2020),
need toand
2018).
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The power
thermoelectric
charge up two
to
in remoteregularly
power
batteries
to power the sensors
areas
regularly
the and
sensors incurs
is
iswith
incurs high
unappealing
issues
high
unappealing maintenance
as
as the
related
maintenance thetoneed
needcosts,
to
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costs, especially
to replace the
disposal.
especially
replace the solar cells (Chen, (CabelloSu,et and al., 2020), and thermoelectric
batteries
in remote regularly
areas incurs high maintenance costs, especially generators
generators
capacitors,
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need in 2018).
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to order
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costs,
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battery disposal.
costs, especially
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disposal.
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Compared with with battery-powered
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power very
2405-8963 Copyright © 2022 The Authors. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license.
very limited
limited functioning
functioning blocks blocks of of the
the power
power management
management
Peer review under responsibility of International Federation of Automatic Control.
10.1016/j.ifacol.2022.10.516
 Zheng Jun Chew et al. / IFAC PapersOnLine 55-27 (2022) 224–229
circuits such as the start-up multiplier and oscillator can
operate, to generate sufficiently high voltage for the circuits
to start working instead of maximising the energy transfer
from the energy harvester (Bose et al., 2021; Lim et al.,
2018). Therefore, this initial charging up phase from cold
start-up can be a lengthy process.
Most research efforts have been focused on the improvement
of the efficiency of the fully operational power management
circuits (Bose et al., 2021; Jayaweera and Muhtaroğlu, 2017;
Katic, Rodriguez, and Rusu, 2016), with little attention
during the cold start-up phase. A switched capacitor (SC)
converter with a variable conversion ratio has been proposed
to improve the charging efficiency of the energy storage
capacitor from cold start-up. The capacitor is directly charged
to the VOC of the energy harvester first before being charged
up to a higher voltage using different conversion ratios of the
SC converter. An improvement of 33.5% was achieved
(Abuellil et al., 2020), which shows there is a potential to
improve the overall charging energy efficiency using direct
charging. Therefore, this work presents an approach to
enhance the charging energy efficiency via optimisation of
the phase of the energy storage capacitor that is directly
charged by the energy harvester. The direct charging of the
energy storage capacitor does not need other circuits such as
a boost converter to actively transfer the energy from the
energy harvester to the energy storage, which eliminates the
low efficiency issue that arises due to the struggle of all the
circuits to operate at low voltage.
(a)
(b)
Fig. 1. Diagram of an energy harvester that is represented by
a voltage source and a resistor charging up a capacitor (a)
directly and (b) via a boost converter
2. PROPOSED ENHANCED CHARGING
The proposed method to enhance the charging energy
efficiency of the power management circuit is achieved by
optimising the duration of the energy storage capacitor is
directly charged by the energy harvester. This is realised by
exploiting the exponential behaviour of the capacitor
charging profile, which will be explained in the following
subsection.
2.1 Theoretical Analysis
Fig. 1 shows the schematic of a generic energy harvester in
its equivalent circuit model that charges up a capacitor C
directly and via a boost converter. The energy harvester is
represented by a voltage source that represents the VOC and a
225
serial resistor R that represents the equivalent resistance of
the energy harvester. When C is directly charged up by the
energy harvester, the voltage VC across and current IC flowing
into the capacitor are given by (1) and (2), respectively.
vC ( t ) = VOC [1 − exp ( −t RC )] (1)
iC ( t ) = [VOC R ] [ exp ( − t RC ) ] (2)
The capacitor energy equation E = CV2/2 shows the voltage
across a capacitor can be related to the energy stored in C. By
substituting (1) into the equation, the energy can be expressed
as (3) and its differentiation yields (4), which is the power.
2
e ( t ) = CVOC 2  [1 − exp ( −t RC )]
2
(3)
pC ( t ) = VOC R  [ exp ( −t RC ) − exp ( −2t RC )] (4)
2
pC gradually increases and reaches its peak as given by (5) at
t = RCln2 where VC = VOC/2 (Chew and Zhu, 2018), before
falling off again.
2
PC( peak ) = VOC 4 R (5)
When a capacitor is charged up via a boost converter, the
output voltage of the energy harvester is always lower than
the VOC of the energy harvester by a fraction of N for
maximum power transfer at the voltage that corresponds to its
maximum power point (MPP). The output voltage of a solar
cell is usually 0.7–0.8 of its VOC while other types of energy
harvesters such as piezoelectric energy harvesters and
thermoelectric generators are 0.5VOC at their MPP (Chew and
Zhu, 2018; Khan and Xiao, 2016; Montecucco and Knox,
2015). Thus, the output voltage of the energy harvester is
VOC/N where N is a real number larger than 1. Maximum
power transfer occurs when the equivalent resistance of the
boost converter matches R of the energy harvester. Thus, the
boost converter has an input current of VOC/2R and the
maximum input power Pi as given by (6):
2
Pi = VOC / ( 2 NR ) (6)
Some power will be consumed by the boost converter before
being transferred to the capacitor. With a given efficiency
ηbst, a boost converter outputs the power Po to a capacitor as
given by (7). The energy transferred to the capacitor is given
by (8).
2
Po = ηbst Pi = ηbstVOC / ( 2 NR ) (7)

Eo = Po dt (8)
Assuming that N = 2, this gives an output voltage of VOC/2,
which is the MPP for many types of energy harvesters. In this
case, Pi = PC(peak) = VOC2/4R. If the boost converter transfers
power from the energy harvester at MPP all the time, Po will
be constant as shown by the solid line in Fig. 2. If ηbst is taken
into account, the horizontal line of Po would be at the same
level as the numbers on the y-axis. For example, Po at 0.8,
0.6, and 0.4 corresponds to the efficiencies of 80%, 60%, and
40%, respectively. Substituting t of RCln2, 2RCln2, and
3RCln2 into (3) yields RCPi/2, 9RCPi/8, and 49RCPi/32,
respectively. Assuming that ηbst = 100% and substituting the
same set of t into (8) yields RCln2Pi, 2RCln2Pi, and
226 Zheng Jun Chew et al. / IFAC PapersOnLine 55-27 (2022) 224–229
3RCln2Pi, respectively. Comparison of the two sets of
theoretical results shows that direct charging of a capacitor is
equivalent to using a boost converter with the efficiencies of
72.13%, 81.15%, and 73.64% at the t of RCln2, 2RCln2, and
3RCln2, respectively.
Fig. 2. Illustration of the capacitor voltage, current and power
profiles
Fig. 3. Comparison of the energy transferred to a capacitor
via a boost converter with different efficiencies and by
direct charging
Fig. 3 shows the profiles of the energies output by boost
converters of different efficiencies and stored in a capacitor
by direct charging. EC is curved, which agrees with the
profile of PC and the above analysis. Thus, there is an optimal
time for direct charging to reach a peak efficiency. The
energy stored in the capacitor by direct charging up until t =
2RCln2, which is 0.75VOC of the energy harvester is higher
than using a boost converter that has an efficiency of 80%.
This means a fully discharged capacitor that is charged up to
0.75VOC of the energy harvester can be charged up quicker
than using just a boost converter unless the boost converter
has an efficiency of over 80% during cold start-up, which is
still challenging to achieve in reality. Even if the capacitor
was charged up to 0.9VOC, the equivalent efficiency is still
over 60%. Such efficiencies are higher than many state-of-
the-art circuits, especially during the cold start-up phase
where the efficiencies are less than 50% (Jayaweera and
Muhtaroğlu, 2017; Paolini et al., 2021).
R Ig Vg VC
VOC Boost Vg VC VSU MUX IC
converter DB
CHP RLP C
VSU - S
CB CLP +
RHP CMP
Fig. 4. Schematic of the circuit for charging a capacitor by a
low voltage energy harvester via direct charging before
using a boost converter
2.2 System Design
Fig. 4 shows the system architecture to realise the proposed
charging scheme of a capacitor. It has a multiplexer (MUX)
for connecting the capacitor to either a boost converter or an
energy harvester and a comparator (CMP) for selecting the
charging method. When the comparator outputs a LOW
signal to the input selector of the multiplexer, the output of
the multiplexer comes from the energy harvester. When the
signal turns HIGH, the output is from the boost converter. A
capacitor C for energy storage is connected to the output of
the multiplexer to be charged by either input. The input of the
boost converter is connected to the energy harvester so that it
can still step-up the voltage as the supply to all the circuits.
The boost converter only needs to charge up a small capacitor
CB instead of the large energy storage capacitor.
The key design is to determine the time to switch from direct
charging to using a boost converter without a fixed threshold
voltage. An RC based filtering technique is used to determine
the switching time (Chew and Zhu, 2018). The voltage from
the energy harvester Vg is fed to a high-pass (HP) filter while
VC is fed to a low-pass (LP) filter. Their outputs as given by
(9) and (10) are connected to the negative and positive inputs
of a comparator, respectively where Vg = VC during the direct
charging phase, τ = RC formed by the resistance of the
energy harvester and the capacitor, τHP = RHPCHP for the HP
filter, and τLP = RLPCLP for the LP filter.
vHP ( t ) = vC ( t ) exp ( −t τ HP )
= VOC [1 − exp ( −t τ ) ][ exp ( −t τ HP ) ] (9)
vLP ( t ) = vC ( t ) [1 − exp ( −t τ LP )]
= VOC [1 − exp ( −t τ )] [1 − exp ( −t τ LP )] (10)
Initially, Vg is higher than VC as the switch of the multiplexer
has a higher resistance, especially during transient where the
switch is yet to be fully turned on. Thus, VHP at the negative
input is higher than VLP at the positive input, which ensures
the output signal S from the comparator is LOW at the
beginning of the system operation. As VHP and VLP started to
cross each other where VHP becomes lower than VLP, signal S
becomes HIGH to switch the output of the multiplexer to be
from the boost converter. The time that the amplitudes of VHP
and VLP become equal is the time to switch from direct
charging to using a boost converter. Let τHP = τLP = τF and
 Zheng Jun Chew et al. / IFAC PapersOnLine 55-27 (2022) 224–229
equating (9) and (10) yields the switching time tSW as given
by (11). From the analysis in the previous section, tSW should
be around 2RCln2. Thus, the time constant of the filters
directly links to tsw where a τF of 2RC means the switching
time occurs at 2RCln2.
tSW = τ F ln 2 (11)
Fig. 5 shows the profiles of VC, VHP and VLP with the time
constants of 2RC. When τ of the equivalent circuit formed by
the capacitor C and the resistance of the energy harvester is
RC and the time constant of the filters τF = 2τ, VHP and VLP
cross each other at t = 2τln2, which occurs at VC = 0.75VOC.
Fig. 5. Voltage profiles of VC, VHP, and VLP with the time
constants of 2RC
3. EXPERIMENTAL VERIFICATION
Fig. 6 shows the experimental setup. A piezoelectric stack
(PICMA® P-887.91, PI ceramic) was used as the energy
harvester. The energy harvester was mounted on and excited
by a shaker (V20, Data Physics) around its resonance
frequency for a low output voltage (Kuang et al., 2021). The
acceleration exerted by the shaker was measured using a laser
Doppler vibrometer (CLV 2534, Polytech). All the
measurements were made using a testbed that comprises
Keithley sourcemeter units (2612B) and National Instruments
data acquisition (NI DAQ) systems.
3.1 Circuit Implementation
A prototype was built using discrete components to validate
the proposed method. The energy storage capacitor is a 22
mF supercapacitor (BZ054B223ZSB) as this capacitance size
can provide sufficient energy if discharged from 3.2 V to 2.2
V to power devices such as a wireless sensor node energy for
several seconds to do meaningful tasks (Chew et al., 2019).
BQ25504 was used as the boost converter to boost a
minimum of 0.35 V to 3.3 V. A small capacitor in the
microfarad range is usually required to store energy for the
operation of BQ25504. Similar to other reported circuits (Lim
et al., 2018; Rozgić and Marković, 2017), this capacitor is
linked to the energy storage capacitor C via an internal
switch. Both capacitors are connected together at 1.8 V,
227
which is the voltage when all the circuit functionalities
including the MPPT is active ("BQ25504 Ultra Low-Power
Boost Converter With Battery Management For Energy
Harvester Applications," 2011). However, the energy storage
capacitor is initially disconnected from the boost converter in
this circuit design. When the multiplexer connects the output
of the boost converter to the energy storage capacitor, the
energy in the small capacitor that stores energy for the
operation of the circuit will be drawn into the large energy
storage capacitor, which lowers the voltage. To prevent
excessive discharge of the small capacitor, diode DB (BAS70)
is used to reduce backflow of the charges from the small
capacitor CB of 10 µF that stores the energy for the circuit
operation to the energy storage capacitor. The comparator
used is TLV3691 and the multiplexer used is ADG849 for
their low power and low voltage requirement.
The piezoelectric energy harvester (PEH) was characterised
by using a frequency response analyzer (PSM1700, Newtons
4th) to determine its impedance over a range of frequencies.
Based on the measured impedance and the value of the
energy storage capacitor chosen, the resistors of the filters are
chosen to be 10 MΩ to minimise power loss while the
capacitors are tuned accordingly. An active voltage doubler
was used to rectify and amplify the output voltage of the PEH
so that there the voltage drop across the rectifier low is and a
sufficiently high rectified voltage is available for the boost
converter to operate (Chew and Zhu, 2020).
Fig. 6. Experimental setup for validation of the direct
charging method using piezoelectric energy harvesting
3.2 Testing Methods
BQ25504 has a minimum start-up voltage of 0.35 V. Thus,
the acceleration exerted by the shaker was tuned until the
rectified output voltage of the piezoelectric energy harvester
is more than 0.6 V for some extra margin. VC, IC, Vg, and Ig
were measured to calculate the energy to verify the
theoretical analysis. Direct measurements of the inputs of the
comparator will give inaccurate results due to the loading
effect as the values of RHP and RLP are quite close to the input
228 Zheng Jun Chew et al. / IFAC PapersOnLine 55-27 (2022) 224–229
impedance of the measurement instrument. Thus, the signal S
from the output of the comparator was measured instead to
verify the circuit operation. The experiment was repeated
using the same test conditions to charge up the capacitor via a
boost converter only as a comparison.
4. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
Fig. 7 shows the comparison of VC of an energy storage
capacitor that is charged up by using the proposed method
and a conventional boost converter where the VOC of the PEH
is 0.9 V when it was excited by an acceleration of 0.05 g at
150 Hz. It can be seen that the proposed method charges up
the capacitor faster than using just a boost converter. The
method of charging up the 22 mF energy storage capacitor
using a boost converter takes 51.57 s to reach 0.17 V while
the proposed method only requires 4.53 s, which is over 91%
faster. With the same time duration of 51.57 s, the proposed
circuit has already charged the capacitor to 0.71 V, which is
over 317% higher than the conventional boost converter.
The capacitor used in the RC filters is 3.3 µF, which gives a
theoretical switching time of 45.75 s. The theoretical
calculation of 0.75VOC of 0.9 V is 0.675 V. The time that the
circuit switches over from direct charging of the energy
storage capacitor to using a boost converter is slightly longer
than the theoretical calculation but still within a good
tolerance. The discrepancies could arise due to the tolerances
of the component used, which could be as high as 20%, and
also the extra time required by the comparator to response.
Fig. 8 shows the energy in the energy storage capacitor EC
and the maximum energy Emax that is available from the
energy harvester. A reference that takes 80% of Emax is
included to show that directly charging an energy storage
capacitor with the energy harvester to up to 0.75VOC of the
energy harvester has an equivalent charging efficiency of
around 80%, which agrees with the theoretical analysis. The
marking of × indicates the time where the circuit switches to
charge the energy storage capacitor via the boost converter.
Fig. 7. Measured VC of an energy storage capacitor that is
charged up by using the proposed method and
conventional boost converter, and the signal S
Fig. 8. Maximum energy Emax from the energy harvester at
100% and 80% as references and EC
5. CONCLUSION
Enhanced charging of an energy storage capacitor from cold
start-up can be achieved by optimising the duration of
directly charging the energy storage capacitor by an energy
harvester up until about 0.75VOC of the energy harvester
before using a boost converter to further step-up the voltage
to the desired level. The direct charging method is shown to
be able to quickly charge up the capacitor to a voltage level
that is over 317% of a conventional boost converter without
the proposed scheme. The circuit implementation is simple
by using a multiplexer to switch between the connection of
the energy storage capacitor to either an energy harvester or
to a boost converter. The switching from direct charging to
using a boost converter can be determined by using a simple
circuit. The circuit utilises RC filters with the time constant
that matches the RC time constant of the equivalent circuit
that is formed by the energy storage capacitor and the
equivalent impedance of the energy harvester. The
experimental results showed good agreement with the
theoretical analysis. A peak equivalent energy transfer
efficiency of over 80% was achieved, which agrees with the
theoretical analysis and over 90% of that energy can be
transferred into an energy storage capacitor.
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