Bionic Fish-Shaped Triboelectric-Electromagnetic Hybrid Generator via a Two-Stage Swing Mechanism for Water Flow Energy Harvesting and Condition Monitoring
Qi Gao, Zhaoxu Jing, Yushan Sun, Sheng Zhang, Chengjie Gu, Lixiang Ma, Hengyu Li, Jianming Wen, Xiaojun Cheng, Tinghai Cheng
Abstract
The water flow energy of rivers is an important renewable and clean energy that plays a vital role in human life but is challenging to harvest at low flow velocity. This work proposes a bionic fish-shaped triboelectric-electromagnetic hybrid generator (BF-TEHG) via a two-stage swing mechanism for harvesting water flow energy. It is designed to simulate the shape of fish, effectively improving its ability to utilize low-velocity water flow energy and enabling it to operate at a minimum flow rate of 0.24 m/s. Furthermore, the impact of motion parameters on electrical performance is studied. The triboelectric and electromagnetic power-generation units can generate peak powers of 0.55 and 0.34 mW in the simulated river environments with a flow velocity of 0.98 m/s. In applications, after being immersed in water for 40 days, the BF-TEHG maintains its electrical performance without reduction, indicating excellent water immersion durability. Therefore, this work proposes an efficient strategy to harvest low-velocity water flow energy and provides an acceptable candidate for monitoring water flow conditions.