High-Efficiency Raindrops Energy Harvester Using Interdigital Electrode

This paper reports a high-efficiency raindrops energy harvester using the interdigital electrode. With the new electrode deployment and connection scheme, the proposed raindrops energy harvester shows excellent energy conversion effeciency up to 2.5%, over 250 times higher than the conventional interdigital electrode-based triboelectric nanogenerator with efficiency of only 0.01%. The performance under the different finger electrodes was investigated. Note that the first electrode of the interdigital electrode is designed for the energy harvesting and the rest are utilized to detect the raindrops speed. We also find out that the open-circuit voltage varies with the tilt angle of the structure, of which the inclination angle of 45 degrees shows the best output performance. And under the condition of 0 degree, the open-circuit voltage first decreases and then gradually remains stable, rather than showing no voltage output. The proposed raindrops generator pushes forward a significant step of realizing raindrops energy harvesting in real-world application.