Power management and energy harvesting for indoor photovoltaic cells system

Abstract

Harvesting electrical power from indoor light condition with very low illuminance levels is very attractive and challenging. It is therefore important to optimize system design so that an energy harvester can provide sufficient energy to the wireless sensor network router nodes. In this paper, we present a novel power management circuit for indoor light harvesting, which includes maximum power point (MPP) circuit, energy storage circuit, instantaneous discharging circuit and DC-DC boost converter. The measured results show that the prototype circuit can harvest energy from indoor light condition and successfully drive a smart wireless sensor node with temperature and humidity sensor.