Vertical-Stalk Flapping-Leaf Generator for Wind Energy Harvesting

Abstract

We study a parallelized flapping piezo-leaf generator for harvesting ambient wind energy and demonstrate an initial design. We fabricated prototypes in various configurations and performed a series of experiments to study performance trends. We propose a novel vertical-stalk L-shape design that exhibits improved output power density over horizontal piezoelectric configurations. While a significant power density performance gap still exists between the current state of piezoelectric devices and commercial wind turbines, their advantage remains in their robust solid-state, low-cost, low-maintenance and scalable construction.