Energy Harvesting SIG
Energy Harvesting Capability Map
Special
Interest
Group
Energy Harvesting
January 2014
The Energy Harvesting
Special Interest Group
The Technology Strategy Board has launched its Emerging Technologies and Industries programme and is working
with partners to build a UK programme in Energy Harvesting. The programme is intended to accelerate the development and commercial use of products, processes and services based on energy harvesting technology. The Energy
Harvesting Special Interest Group (SIG) brings together the
community along the value chain – from academia, materials technologies, devices, systems integration and through
to the user communities helping build a vibrant and productive Energy Harvesting community in the UK.
The information in this report will be used by the SIG to
widen the debate about where energy harvesting may have
a role to play. It will also provide input to briefings for funding agencies on challenge areas to be supported.
Contents
002
The Energy Havresting Special Interest
Group
004
Executive Summary
005
Introduction
006
Academic Community
015
033
Analysis
039
Energy Harvesting SIG Community Activities
040
2
Industrial Community and Energy
Harvesting Supply Chain
Energy Harvesting SWOT Analysis
3
Executive Summary
Summary of the Outcomes
The Energy Harvesting Capability map is an exercise
that helps to understand the current level of innovation in this area and will serve as a reference to monitor the future impact of innovation support activities
funded by TSB.
This report covered both academic and industrial
communities. Energy harvesting research is very
strong in the UK with 29 universities and 74 principal investigators working with 158 research students
and postdoctoral researchers. The academic community demonstrated commercial awareness and
willingness to collaborate with industry.
Further 130 companies, primarily members of the Energy Harvesting Special Interest Group (EH SIG) and
the Energy Harvesting Network were mapped onto a
supply chain. With healthy numbers in enabling technologies (materials, transducers, electronics etc.)
and applications and end users the bottleneck was
identified in the area of energy harvesting devices. A
clear challenge is in finding applications for energy
harvesting which are of sufficient scale to support
a viable business when the technology is still rather
bespoke for each application.
Among the members of energy harvesting components and devices technical capabilities are well
balanced and cover materials for transduction and
manufacturing, vibration, solar, thermal and other
energy harvesting technologies.
Analysis of 9 different sectors, which were originally
examined in the “Industry Needs Analysis: Potential opportunities for energy harvesting” report published by the EH SIG in May 2013 showed three clear
leaders. These are Infrastructure & Structural Monitoring, Aerospace and Industrial Process Control &
Monitoring.
The report has also identified two strong industrial
clusters around the University of Southampton and
the University of Cambridge. The academic exper-
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tise is widely distributed across the UK and in many
leading universities.
Though we expect progress to be made in this area
through collaborative projects funded by the Technology Strategy Board in 2012, more should be done
in the future. Bringing design and product development companies into collaborative projects, which
wasn’t the case in the previous funding competition,
potentially offers an opportunity to bolster innovation
and commercialisation in the area of energy harvesting. In addition, more effort to engage system integrators should help the supply chain develop further.
Energy Harvesting SWOT Analysis
The SWOT analysis highlighted that the strong research base in the UK that has produced a number
of excellent advanced energy harvesting technologies has not translated into equally strong businesses. The reasons are numerous: fragmented applications with specific requirements, complex supply
chain, disconnection between R&D players on the
one side and systems companies and users on the
other. Despite these weaknesses and facing a number of threats to its potential to be world leading in
energy harvesting, the UK EH community is in a good
position to benefit from the opportunities emerging
locally and internationally. The EH SIG will continue
supporting companies and academics involved in
the Energy Harvesting sector and its activities will be
outlined in the business plan for 2014-2015.
Introduction
About
This report maps the capabilities relevant to energy
harvesting in the UK and identifies the organisations
active in energy harvesting research and development as well as commercial exploitation. It serves
two specific purposes:
1. A baseline mapping of energy harvesting activity
in the UK for the Technology Strategy Board (TSB)
to support their tracking of impact of support for the
area under the Emerging Technologies Programme
2. A more widely available resource to enable those
interested in the exploitation of energy harvesting
technologies to find both academic and commercial
expertise
Energy Harvesting Special Interest Group
The report has been compiled by the Energy Harvesting Special Interest Group (EH SIG). The TSB
established the EH SIG to help accelerate the development and commercial use of products, processes
and services based on energy harvesting technology, through networking the full supply chain and
facilitating the emergence of a self-sustaining commercial ecosystem.
Further information on the EH SIG can be found at
https://connect.innovateuk.org/web/eh1
The EH SIG brings together the community along the
value chain – from academia, materials technologies,
devices, systems integration and through to the user
communities helping build a vibrant and productive
Energy Harvesting community in the UK.
Approach and scope
The report sets out to address the following objectives:
• Identify and describe capabilities of UK academic
groups
• Identify and describe capabilities of technology
supply companies in the UK
• Identify companies that have used or evaluated energy harvesting
• Map community activities related to energy harvesting
• Provide analysis of UK strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats
To do so a variety of sources were consulted including the EH SIG’s own membership, the membership
of the EPSRC funded Energy Harvesting Network,
attendees at a range of energy harvesting related
conferences, events and workshops, successful
applicants to the TSB’s ‘Energy Harvesting for Autonomous Sensing’ competition and LinkedIn Energy Harvesting Group. Relevant organisations were
questioned to understand capabilities and levels of
commercial interaction.
Whilst there is good confidence that the majority of
academic groups and energy harvesting technology
developer companies have been captured it is not
possible to provide a comprehensive picture of every potential user company that has evaluated energy harvesting or has otherwise shown significant
interest in the technology. For this part of the supply
chain our intention is rather to provide a more qualitative view based on the membership of the EH SIG
and Energy Harvesting Network. This enables a reasonably clear understanding of which applications
sectors have been most actively engaged so far and
therefore where there is potential for further support
either to focus effort by sector or to help less represented application sectors to understand the potential of the technology to address their challenges.
We welcome any input on companies or academic
groups that have been actively engaged in energy
harvesting work and have not been captured here.
Please forward information to alex.efimov@ktn-uk.
org.
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Academic Community
Introduction
As the very beginning of the supply chain for commercial energy harvesting devices, the academic
community is the primary source of knowledge on
the development of the technology. The academic
base in the UK has been investigated to understand
its extent and the degree to which it is enabling commercial exploitation of energy harvesting technologies.
Approach and sources
In order to be as comprehensive as possible in
surveying the UK academic community a range of
sources were consulted initially to establish the likely
groups active in the field. These included the membership of the Energy Harvesting Network, attendees at a range of European energy harvesting events
and research projects involving significant energy
harvesting focus. Once these academics had been
identified effort was made to identify from them,
which were substantially involved in energy harvesting related research as opposed to just having an interest in the technology. These candidates were then
contacted for a further level of detail on their activities. Following this the information was consolidated
on a per institution basis.
Analysis
This analysis presents a view of the state of the UK
academic energy harvesting community. In particular, it focuses on how large and diverse this community is and the extent to which it interacts with the
business community. This level of interaction will be
key to the success of any efforts to commercialise
the technology in the UK.
Research groups with substantial activity in energy harvesting were identified at 29 universities. In
a number of these cases there was more that one
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department involved at the institution and in such
cases these were not always collaborating with each
other. This is a significant growth in activity since
a less rigorous identification of research groups in
2008 found less than 10 institutions engaged in energy harvesting.
Energy harvesting related R&D is primarily carried
out in various engineering departments (electronic,
electrical, mechanical, aerospace). There are also
a smaller number of groups in chemistry, computer
science, materials sciences and other departments.
In terms of research personnel, 74 Principal Investigators (PI’s) were identified. These ranged from
some large groups with up to 5 PI’s to many with
a single PI. Working for these PI’s are 158 research
students and postdoctoral researchers. Again there
is very significant variety in research group size ranging from a single student to the largest groups having 10-14 researchers under supervision.
The clearest indication of the extent to which academic energy harvesting researchers are facilitating
commercial exploitation of the technology is to be
found in their interaction with industry. Only 8 of the
28 institutions have not been involved in any industrial collaborative work yet. Companies from across
energy harvesting systems and component developers through to potential end users of energy harvesting powered solutions have all engaged in collaborative R&D. This clearly indicates that the majority
of academics are interested in commercially relevant
R&D and also that the industrial community recognises the need to access the significant expertise in
academia in this field.
Further positive indication of commercial focus
emerging in the academic community is that 12 of
the 28 institutions have indicated patenting activity.
This includes patents received, applied for or applications currently being prepared.
There are many academic conferences covering
energy harvesting technologies. These range from
technology specific ones through to more general
conferences such as PowerMEMs. An important
indicator though of how readily the academic community is reaching out to industry is in the extent of
presentation at events or workshops where there is
a significant industrial audience. This helps to raise
awareness of the technology, its capabilities and limitations and also helps industry to identify expertise
to help it address industrial applications. It is therefore very encouraging that 16 of the 28 institutions
have already presented at such industrially focused
events. There is still however scope for further encouragement of the academics to raise awareness
or their work.
integrating energy harvesting solutions the UK has
a significant technical advantage on which to build
commercial exploitation.
The academic groups are listed in the table below
along with a short description of their areas of activity. The groups themselves provided these descriptions. The Principal Investigators are also listed.
There is coverage of all major technology areas within the community including vibrational (electromagnetic, piezoelectric and electrostatic and newer techniques such as magnetostrictive), thermoelectric, RF
and photovoltaic (including novel 3rd generation PV
materials). There is also considerable focus on the
electronics and power management and in systems
design and modeling.
It is worth noting that there is no particular geographical clustering of energy harvesting expertise
in the UK. There are very strong groups in all of England, Scotland and Wales.
In summary, the academic energy harvesting community in the UK is a real strength. There are a significant and growing number of groups with a high
proportion actively engaged in industrially collaborative R&D. Other indicators also support a view that
the community has a significant interest in industrial
engagement and commercial exploitation. The existence of the Energy Harvesting Network has served
to make the community more cohesive. This technical base is something that can be built on with
the high interest in energy harvesting showed by
the potential user community. Despite the relatively
small number of companies currently developing or
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Universities and Investigators
Bangor
Jeff Kettle
Bath
H Alicia Kim, Chris Bowen, Chris Clarke, Dan Inman (Visiting)
Bedfordshire
Ben Allen, Tahmina Ajmal, David Jazani, Vladimir
Dyo, Masood Ur Rehman
Bolton
Elias Siores, Guosheng Shao, Jack Luo, Tahir
Shah
Bristol
Bernard Stark, Steve Burrow, Dan Inman (visiting
prof), Simon Neild, David Barton
Brunel
Antonio Vilches
Cambridge
Robin Langley and Malcolm Smith, Gehan Amaratunga, Richard McMahon
8
Areas of expertise / research
OPVs/DSCs (design, fabrication, simulation under
indoor conditions, improving performance under
low light conditions). Wireless sensor network development/energy management circuits. Flexible
thermoelectric generators.
Cardiff
Gao Min
Carol Featherston, Karen Holford, Rhys Pullin,
Jonathan Lees
Energy harvesting for the development of autonomous structural health monitoring systems, with
particular interest in the aerospace industry and
using vibration and thermal energy harvesting.
Also novel techniques such as ‘active’ vibration
harvesting (transferring energy through vibrations
to remote locations) and the use of RF. Power
management including hybrid storage for structural health monitoring using harvested energy.
Developing energy harvesting for broadband
operations using bistable piezoelectric composites. Expertise is in optimisation and modelling of
nonlinear composite and piezoelectrics
Specialise in radio frequency energy harvesting,
i.e., harnessing the energy present in radio waves
to power electronic devices. Have recently demonstrated powering a digital device from ambient radio signals over a distance of 2.5km using
a compact device. Also looking at the design of
window-mounted antennas for RF energy harvesting, as well as the possibility of recharging
mobile devices from scavenged energy.
Research is based on Smart Materials including
Photovoltaic (Organic and Flexible), Piezoelectric,
Thermoelectric, Shape Memory Alloys (Polymer
based), Auxetic and Magnetic (Polymer). Such
material systems by themselves or in hybrid
configurations are used for embedded electronic
systems for energy harvesting and storage.
Mainly deal with a) Dynamics, b) Electromagnetic
devices, c) Power electronics, d) Systems covering a-c. Also work on power management, coldstart, operation under intermittent conditions,
remote powering of medical sensors.
Main focus of projects involves developing thermoelectric materials, devices and measurement
systems for thermal energy harvesting application, in particular, solar thermal, and waste heat
from automobiles.
Coventry
Vaughn Shilton
Cranfield
Zhaorong Huang, Chris Sansom
Exeter
Meiling Zhu, Chris Smith
Modelling and optimization of the vibrational energy harvesting devices and the associated power
electronic areas.
Research focus on pyroelectric, piezoelectric,
and thermoelectric energy harvesting.
Research activities focus on energy harvesting
with an “integrated system vision” ranging from
novel transducer design, power management,
prototyping and testing to integration of the developed energy harvesting devices into wireless
sensing systems for applications. Expertise is in
design, modelling (both analytical modelling and
finite element modelling), prototyping and characterising of energy harvesting powered wireless
sensing systems.
Electronic energy harvesting using piezo-ceramics, inductive coupling / near field, RF / microwave and piezo-polymers (PVDF)
Theoretical work to understand how structures
and suspension systems absorb energy from a
statistical distribution of vibrations. Integrating energy storage with collection e.g. supercapacitors.
Solar collection. Convert the motion of a cantilever, or whatever mechanical element is used, into
electrical energy. Wave Energy.
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Glasgow
Andrew Knox, Douglas Paul, Duncan Gregory
Semiconductor Peltier / Seebeck effects. Micropower sensors. Maximum Power point tracking
converters. DC to DC converters. Control systems.
Wireless sensors. Industrial plant monitoring.
Design, device fabrication and characterisation of
low dimensional thermoelectric materials. Microfabrication of test structures to measure the electrical
conductivity, thermal conductivity and Seebeck
coefficients. Design and microfabrication of thermoelectric modules.
Synthesis and processing of bulk and nanostructured materials. with an emphasis on new compositions (materials) and microstructures. Materials
characterisation: X-ray and neutron diffraction, SEM
(with EDX) and TEM, thermogravimetric analysis
and differential thermal analysis, SQUID magnetometry (with transport measurements).
Hull
James Gilbert, Jay Wadhawan
Imperial College London
Eric Yeatman, Paul Mitcheson, Andrew Holmes,
Stepan Lucyszyn, Kristel Fobelets
Leeds
Andrew Bell
10
Human derived energy harvesting, frequency adaptive vibration based harvesters, electromagnetic
harvesters
Vibration and motion energy harvesting: fundamental theory, electrostatic and piezoelectric devices,
MEMS devices, rotational harvesters, power electronics for harvesters, system design, applications
for machinery monitoring, body sensor networks,
and others. RF Harvesting: devices, circuits, measurements. Thermal harvesters: phase change
thermal harvesters for aircraft applications (design
simulation, device development and test); novel
thermoelectric materials including silicon nanowires
for thermoelectric generation. Wireless power transfer: (not exactly harvesting but closely related) high
power RF transfer using tuned coils, and associated
power electronics; ultrasonic power transfer including MEMS devices for remotely powered actuation.
Development of piezoelectric materials to replace
current market leader PZT, particularly for either
higher energy density or to work under conditions
(e.g. high temperature) not possible with PZT
London South Bank
Hari Reehal
Loughborough
Stephanos Theodossiades
Manchester
S Olutunde Oyadiji, Philip Bonello
Roger Shuttleworth
Photovoltaic materials and devices, mainly based
on thin film crystalline silicon. Performance monitoring of small area flexible PV modules. Interested
in exploring low power, small area and/or flexible
structures for EH applications.
Powertrain/Drivetrain Engineering, Dynamics, Vibrations, Medical Devices.
Development of vibration energy harvesting devices using piezo fibre composite strips, PZT (Lead
Zirconate Titanate) and PMNT (Lead Magnesium
Niobate-Lead Titanate) patches.
Development of aeroelastic energy harvesting devices using piezoelectric, triboelectric and electromagnetic elements.
Development of electronic power management
boards for managing and storage of harvested energy, and for recharging batteries.
Parametric analysis of cantilevered piezoelectric
vibration energy harvesters (VEHs) using equivalent circuit model (ECM) and finite element method
(FEM).
Optimisation of cantilevered piezoelectric vibration
energy harvesters by variation of their geometric
configurations including rectangular, convergent
and divergent tapered cantilevered configurations.
Development of multi-resonance broadband vibration energy harvesters using a modal approach.
Optimal design of multi-layer stacked vibration
energy harvesters consisting of multi-layer beams,
of zigzag configurations, with rigid masses attached
between the beams.
Efficient computations of the power output and
performance of cantilevered single beam and multiple stacked beam piezoelectric vibration energy
harvesters using mass ratio and electromechanical
coupling coefficients derived by a modal finite element analysis without the need for a full distributed
parameter analysis.
Novel electronics, piezoelectric cantilever designs,
thermo electric harvesters, and RF energy harvesting.
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Newcastle
Michele Pozzi
Nottingham
Stewart McWilliam, Atanas Popov
Queen Mary University of London
Steven Dunn
Yue Chen, Michael Chai
Active in analytical and FEA modelling of piezoelectric Energy Harvesters. Focus on wearable EH, mostly
piezoelectric but also other technologies.
Expertise in the field of dynamics, vibration, characterisation and manufacturing. Detailed models
have been developed to simulate the behaviour of
piezoelectric vibrational energy harvesters. Extensive
experimental work has been carried out in laboratory
environment for model validation. The overall aim is
to optimise the design of devices and extend their
applicability to different environment and sectors.
Materials development and device development chemical synthesis of piezoelectric materials, device
fabrication and testing. Synthesise ZnO nanorods
onto a variety of substrates and incorporate into
piezoelectric energy harvesting devices. These are
tested both at QMUL and NPL. Also produce a range
of photovoltaic devices based on ZnO nanostructures.
Energy efficient resource allocation for energy harvesting enabled wireless devices.
Reading
Anthony Powel, Paz Vaqueiro, Ricardo Grau-Crespo
Sheffield (and Rolls Royce UTC within Sheffield)
Nicola Morley
Bryn Jones
Principal interests are in the development of new
materials for thermoelectric devices for energy
harvesting. This encompasses materials preparation, consolidation techniques , structural analysis,
physical property measurements and computational
investigations. Materials under investigation include
chalcogenides and intermetallics.
Main research covers magnetostrictive materials for
energy harvesters. Investigating new magnetostrictive materials, as an alternative to Metglas for energy
harvesters.
Investigating the use of COTS energy harvesting
technologies to power wireless sensor packages,
primarily within RR engines.
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Southampton
Steve Beeby, Geoff Merrett, Neil White, Nick Harris,
John Tudor
Vibration energy harvesting (bistable structures, novel
techniques for maximising inertial mass, optimised
piezoelectric materials)
Low temperature materials for harvesting energy from
fabrics (thermal and kinetic)
Harvesting from human motion
Energy harvesting systems and their optimisation
(energy management and storage)
Energy storage research (fabric supercaps and long
term energy storage systems)
Airflow energy harvesting (miniaturised and applied)
Wireless power transfer
St Andrews
Richard Baker
Strathclyde
Martin Judd, Nina Roscoe
Working on using electro-active polymers (EAPs) as
systems for harvesting mechanical motion such as
vibrations and storing this as electrical charge. Prepare simple EAP devices and measure the electrical
response to a set of controlled mechanical stimuli.
Particularly interested in the relationships between
structure, composition and performance. Possible
applications include in autonomous sensors, medical
devices, high tech clothing, autonomous robots and
larger scale energy generation.
Main focus has been on harvesting energy from electric and magnetic fields in the vicinity of high voltage
electricity transmission and distribution equipment at
distances where harvesters could be deployed safely
without a power outage. The intended application is
particularly to power wireless sensors for condition
monitoring and asset prognostics. Proof of concept
demonstrators for both electric field and magnetic
field energy harvesting have been developed. Also
involved in developing technology for energy harvesting from vibrations using magnetostrictive materials.
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Industrial Community & Energy
Harvesting Supply Chain
Approach and sources
Surrey
Rob Dorey
Swansea
Sondipon Adhikari, Mike Friswell, Lijle Li
West of Scotland
Frank Placido, Shigeng Song
Research is focused on three interlocking themes:
1. Design, fabrication and use of personal energy
generation solutions based on functional materials and devices including thermoelectric, ferroelectric, pyroelectric, piezoelectric and solid oxide
fuel cell devices. 2. Design, fabrication and use
of environmental and structural health monitoring
sensors. 3. Environmentally friendly manufacturing routes, which minimise energy, material and
chemical usage, for producing functional materials and devices. The three themes come together
in the manufacture and development of self-powered sensor nodes.
A total of 364 individual members of the EH SIG, including academics and industrialists, were reviewed
and analysed to understand the current status of the
EH sector. Other companies were identified through
Google search, LinkedIn and network referrals as
well as an analysis of UK company members of the
Energy Harvesting Network. Though the list is by
no means exhaustive, it provides a comprehensive
snapshot of the Energy Harvesting sector in the UK.
Focussed on two main aspects regarding vibration based energy harvesting – namely nonlinearity and uncertainty. Have done theoretical
and experimental works on energy harvesting
by exploiting nonlinear vibration phenomenon.
Also quantifying harvested energy when there are
uncertainties in the input motion and/or systems
parameters.
- Energy Harvesting Components, which includes
materials for transduction and basic electronics and
transducers
Research covers thin films and sensors. We can
make large scale devices on a variety of substrates, including polymer film, using commercial-scale deposition equipment. Currently we
are working on piezoelectric films and low cost
hetero-junction solar cells.
The companies were reviewed and qualified based
on the information gathered from their websites or
direct contacts. Then they were mapped onto the
supply chain diagram, which consists of the following elements:
- Energy Harvesting Devices or complete energy
harvesters ready for integration into various industrial applications
- Energy Harvesting Design and Consultancy companies
considered separately.
Energy Harvesting Components
In total 20 companies were identified as relevant to
this category.
Johnson Matthey, Morgan Advanced Materials plc
and CeramTec UK Ltd make piezo ceramics and
therefore clearly fit into this category. A number of
other companies such as BASF, Tata Chemicals and
other have potential to supply the Energy Harvesting
sector. This group includes one company from Japan, one from Cyprus, two companies from the US
and one international, because though BASF writes
about its interest in EH, it is impossible to determine
where this activity is located.
In this category we can see a strong cluster of companies that make solar energy harvesting cells:
Sharp, G24 Power, Solar Press and Eight19.
A number of companies in the table below are foreign companies or large internationals with variable
levels of presence in the UK. The location is shown
in the table below in brackets.
- Industrial Applications and End Users: a category
that includes companies, which made a significant
progress towards or have reached the market already. Typically a company in the Industrial Applications category would have sold EH products to users or have commercialisation partners. A company
from the End Users group is typically an established
business with a clear unfulfilled need in energy harvesting.
‘Industrial Applications’ and ‘End Users’ were
merged together in this report because the TRL and
the level of adoption are often difficult to judge based
on the information available in the public domain. In
the future updates of this report, when the ‘Industrial
Applications” category gains more weight, it will be
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Company (Country)
Areas of Expertise
W.E. Amies & Co Ltd (UK)
Tata Chemicals (UK/India)
Tata Chemicals is a large chemicals and materials company. There is no explicit involvement in
energy harvesting but there is potential through its
advanced materials business that includes nano
materials, metals, ceramics, nano powder, nano
composites , nano coatings, customisation for both
structural and functional applications.
The company specializes in the production of injection moulded components; it supplies a number of
energy harvesting businesses including Perpetuum
Ltd.
Sharp (UK/Japan)
Sharp is very active in energy storage research focusing on improving the performance of traditional
batteries to inventing new energy storage solutions.
The storage capacity range is very broad covering
energy harvesting among other applications. They
also have a novel PV material for indoor EH and are
involved in a project to develop this further.
Centre for Process Innovation (UK)
The Centre for Process Innovation is a UK-based
technology innovation centre and part of the High
Value Manufacturing Catapult. CPI offers applied
knowledge in science and engineering combined
with facilities to develop, prove, prototype and scale
up the next generation of products and processes.
CPI has expertise in printed photovoltaics ,which is
directly relevant to energy harvesting.
pragmatIC Printing Ltd (UK)
PragmatIC Printing is a UK company based in
Cambridge. It enables printed logic circuits that
introduce intelligence and interactivity into a wide
range of products and applications, in form factors that are not possible using silicon chips – for
example: ultra thin, flexible, robust, transparent,
disposable. This technology has potential for energy
harvesting applications.
ST Microeletronics (UK/International)
STMicroelectronics is a large international semiconductor company with an R&D Centre in Edinburgh, UK. It makes ICs integrating all the functions
needed to power electronic circuits and recharge
batteries using either a solar cell or Thermo-Electric
Generator (TEG).
National Physical Laboratory (UK)
Piezoelectric materials R&D; development of metrology & standards for EH
NSG (UK/Japan)
Pilkington Glass is a UK subsidiary of NSG: expertise in manufacturing glass for solar applications.
Brewer Science (UK/USA)
Brewer Science delivers innovative material, process and equipment solutions for lithography,
MEMS, nanotechnology, and other applications.
Some of its advanced materials are applicable to
energy harvesting.
Ceramtec Group (UK/Germany)
Manufacturers of advanced ceramic components
including piezo cermaics. UK operations are primarily focused on sales and marketing.
Ilika Plc (UK)
Ilika Plc is an R&D intensive advanced materials
company. Ilika’s focus is on materials with greater
capacity for energy storage and conversion efficiency, for example in batteries. Some of those
advanced materials could be used in energy harvesting.
DCN Corporation (UK)
The company is based at Daresbury, one of the
UK’s largest research facilities. The company is
developing advanced nanomaterials applying the
nano-technology onto plastic polymers to be used
in electronics and biomedical device application
sectors. DCN are interested in using their materials
in energy harvesting too.
Morgan Advanced Materials plc (UK)
MTC ElectroCeramics supplies piezoelectric components and capacitors for the latest power generation and electricity distribution systems. Piezoelectric materials are directly applicable to energy
harvesting.
Johnson Matthey Plc (UK)
Johnson Matthey Piezoproducts is a world leading
manufacturer of technical ceramics, with focus on
the development and production of Piezoceramic
components
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G24 Power Ltd (UK)
A UK maker of thin film DSSC. Not a member of
EH SIG.
Solar Press UK Ltd (UK)
Solar Press is a leading developer of lightweight,
low cost, flexible solar panels based on organic
photovoltaic (OPV) technology. The company is
working with Gas Sensing Solutions Ltd to develop a CO2 sensor powered by energy harvesting.
Eight19 Ltd (UK)
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The company is a developer and manufacturer
of third generation solar cells based on printed
plastic. Originating from technology initially developed at Cambridge University in the UK, these
flexible, robust, lightweight solar modules benefit
from high-speed manufacturing and low fabrication costs.
European Thermodynamics Ltd (UK)
The company’s area of expertise is heat management, which also includes TEGs for energy harvesting and recently solar modules.
Molecular Solar Ltd.
Molecular Solar is a spin-out company from the
University of Warwick. The Company has been
established to commercialise third generation
solar cell technology.
FeONIC
Feonic PLC is a UK registered company that
develops industry leading audio products based
upon its own extensive portfolio of patents and IP.
They also have patents covering energy harvesting from vibration.
A small group of companies with no UK R&D or manufacturing activities were registered with the Energy Harvesting SIG.
They are listed in a separate table below.
Company (Country)
Areas of Expertise
KDF (USA)
Experts in thin film sputtering: some of their manufacturing capabilities would be relevant to energy
harvesting.
Archimedes International (Cyprus)
Archimedes Polymer Technologies is a producer of
nanoparticle enabled solutions for polymers, metals
and ceramics.
BASF (USA/DE)
BASF is a large international materials and chemicals company.
Aivaka (USA)
Our proprietary solutions can operate from an input
of 0.8V to 6V and provide an output as low as 30mV.
So, our technology can create a “battery independent” solution for portable electronics so that the
system to operate from 2, 3, 4 AA/AAA (NiMH, NiCd
or Alkaline) batteries or any single Lithium battery
without any change to the system power management section.
Linear Technology (USA)
Linear Technology manufactures a wide range of
ultra-low power ICs targeted for energy harvesting applications. Power management products that
convert energy from Vibration (Piezo), PhotoVoltaic
(Solar) and Thermal (TEC, TEG, Thermopiles, Thermocouples) sources provide high efficiency conversion to regulated voltages or to charge batteries and
super capacitor storage elements. Boost converters
that operate from as little as 20mV or battery chargers with Maximum Power Point capability expand
the possibilities for a wide variety of industrial automation and control, wireless sensor, transportation,
automotive and building management applications.
Ultra-low quiescent current linear regulators, op
amps, comparators, voltage supervisors, analog to
digital converters, digital to analog converters and
micropower voltage references provide additional
fundamental building blocks required for autonomous systems.
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Energy Harvesting Devices
7 companies fall into the energy harvesting devices including seven companies in this category representing the UK, and
others coming from Israel, Germany, Japan, France and the US. Companies in this category are different in terms of supplying energy harvesters that already include electronics in addition to transducers and are capable of either replacing a
battery or extending a battery life.
Perpetuum deserves to be mentioned in a number of different categories but because it’s vibration energy harvester
could be used in a number of different applications, it was given a higher weight, which places the company in the energy
harvesting devices group.
20
Company (Country)
Areas of Expertise
Perpetuum Ltd. (UK)
Perpetuum is a UK pioneer in commercialization
of the vibration energy harvesting and an excellent
example of a viable vertically integrated business
focused on applications in rail transport and industrial monitoring.
Joulefusion Ltd (UK)
Joulefusion Limited is based at the Oxford Centre
for Innovation and focused on developing innovative
energy harvesting devices. It is an early stage business so they didn’t publish much information about
their technologies.
Witt Energy (UK)
The WITT is a technology capable of collecting
chaotic movement in any direction and turning it into
useable power. The WITT collects energy from Natural Occurring Motional Energy in WATER, (sea river
or tidal) WIND, or HUMAN/ANIMAL movement with
no impact on the environment.
Piezotag Ltd (UK)
Tyre pressure monitoring IP, offer consultancy related
to energy harvesting. The company is not a member
of EH SIG.
Pavegen Systems Ltd. (UK)
Pavegen tile is a device that harvests energy from
the footstep. The technology converts the kinetic
energy to electricity, which can be stored and used
for a variety of applications.
Fusion Innovation (UK)
Claim patent pending rolling motion energy generator (tyre rpessure monitoring) and radiator energy
harvester (fusion-innovations.com)
Ronsek Innovation Ltd. (UK)
Ronsek is an R&D company focused on developing
vibration energy harvesting devices. Applications
vary from limb movement to swimming fish monitoring.
Though the size of this group is relatively small, all major energy harvesting technologies, including vibration/motion,
solar energy and heat harvesting are well represented.
In addition to the previous table, 3 foreign companies, members of the EH SIG, fit into this category.
Company (Country)
Areas of Expertise
Sol Chip (Israel)
Sol Chip develops, sells and licenses a costeffective, compact Solar Battery technology that
integrates solar energy sources to power wireless
sensors and mobile electronics devices.
Arveni (France)
Arveni is a French start-up, which core business is
the energy harvesting using piezo electricity.
Würth Elektronik GmbH & Co. KG, (Germany)
Würth Elektronik is one of Europe’s biggest manufacturer of electronic & electromechanical components. The company is very active in the area of
energy harvesting: they supply a large number of
EH components and power electronics. WE is also
an active member of the EH SIG. They are involved
in EH SIG events on a regular basis both exhibiting
and giving talks. WE also sell fully functional energy
harvesting demo kits for piezo, solar and TEG technologies.
21
Energy Harvesting Design and Consultancy
LMW Electronics Ltd. (UK)
The Energy Harvesting SIG has attracted a number of design and engineering consultancies. Their interest in the EH SIG
is primarily driven by new business development: they don’t specialise in energy harvesting but see it at as a potential
growth area.
LMW Electronics Limited has designed, manufactured and integrated specialist radio frequency
products.
Plextek Ltd (UK)
The company is a large UK electronics design
consultancy based in Cambridge providing design
services to the communications, defence, automotive, industrial, scientific and medical markets and
also design and supply its own electronic products.
Costain Group PLC
Costain is an engineering consultancy. It delivers solutions across Infrastructure (highways, rail,
power and airports) and Natural Resources (water,
nuclear process, waste and hydrocarbons and
chemicals).
Sentec Ltd (UK)
Sentec is a Cambridge, UK based R&D and product development company with track record in
markets such as Smart Grid, Metering, Smart
Home and Consumer Goods.
Frazer-Nash (UK/Australia)
Frazer-Nash is multidisciplinary engineering consultancy with offices in the UK and Australia.
MIRA Ltd.
MIRA is an independent vehicle engineering consultancy based in Warwickshire UK.
Spirax-Sarco Limited (UK)
Steam engineering consulting.
THHINK Wireless Technologies Ltd (UK/Japan)
The company is a system integrator specializing in
the development of robust, ultra-low power embedded wireless sensors, energy harvesting and
custom platforms for diagnostics, condition/health
monitoring, telemetry and control. THHINK is also
active in Japan and is a member of the Electret Alliance.
KBO Dynamics Ltd (UK)
KBO Dynamics is a design consultancy and supplier of high performance electronic power and
control devices, such high voltage switched mode
power supplies and bespoke embedded control
systems. The company claims EH expertise that
they can design, develop and supply energy harvesting solutions; TEG, piezo, PV.
SolidDesign Consultancy (UK)
The company allegedly have developed prototype
EH flooring for footfall.
Sagentia (UK)
Technology and product development consultancy.
Bayford Systems Ltd (UK)
Radio systems and RF circuit design consultancy
Plextek Consulting would be a typical company from this group. They are specialists in product and systems design
for communications, automotive, aerospace, defence and medical applications. All those sectors of interest to Plextek
are highly relevant to Energy Harvesting and though energy harvesting technologies are not mentioned explicitly on the
Plextek’s website, the potential is there.
22
Company (Country)
Areas of Expertise
Braac Technology Ltd. (UK)
Electronics design consultancy.
ML Electronics (UK)
ML Electronics creatively designs new products in
regulatory controlled markets from concept to prototype, approval, pre-production and small batch
assembly
Benthic Sciences LLP (UK)
Benthic Sciences is a UK electronic engineering design consultancy service that specialises in
embedded processing applications for challenging
environments.
Concept Shed Ltd. (UK)
The company offers a mixture of creative and technical R&D using its workshops and electronics lab,
including industrial & product design, electrical and
electronic design, mechanical engineering, embedded software development, human interaction &
interfaces, lighting design, 3D CAD, prototyping in
wood, metals and plastics, welding & sheet metal
work, routing, 3D micro milling, engraving, laser
and waterjet cutting, high build spray painting,
machine shop work, field trials, graphic design,
packaging design, audio recording & editing, project management, automata, resin & polyurethane
casting, fibre glass, animatronics & mechatronics
and etc.
The Technology Partnership (TTP) (UK)
TTP is a large product development company
working across all industrial sectors but particularly
active in telecommunications, medical devices,
industrial automation, energy and oil&gas.
Petrex (UK)
Petrex are a UK based company with a proven
track record in offshore energy developments.
23
Ichor Systems (US/UK)
Ichor makes critical subsystems and turnkey
process equipment. The company has capabilities in design and creation and offers outsourced
solutions ranging from product concept to turnkey
manufacturing to legacy service.
Antares (UK)
Antares TDC designs, manufacture, supplies and
supports on-board vehicle and off-grid auxiliary
electrical power with associated control and data
systems.
Synapse Electronics (UK)
Synapse Electronics is yet another University of
Southampton spinout that develops energy harvesting solutions for environmental monitoring sensors utilising EnOcean technology.
IDTechEx
The company is not developing energy harvesting
technology but active in the area as a consultancy,
information provider and events organizer.
TRW Conekt (UK)
TRW Conekt is a consultancy and engineering test
services business that generates new ideas and
applies science & technology to product development, manufacture and validation. The company
works very closely with the ESP Community of the
KTN and the Energy Harvesting SIG.
TRW Conekt are looking into aerospace and automotive opportunities for energy harvesting as a
possible power source for powering wireless sensors.
In the automotive sector TEG technology looks
very promising because readily available sources
of heat (such as for example exhaust pipes) and a
relatively low cost of TEGs, which could be massproduced.
24
End Users and Industrial Applications
This is the largest and the most diverse group of companies in this review. They represent a large number of industrial
sectors and were identified on the basis of either evidence of using energy harvesting or potential to do so in the future.
Company (Country)
Areas of Expertise
Meggitt PLC (UK) (AE)
The company is a global engineering group specialising in extreme environment components and
sub-systems for aerospace, defence and energy
markets. They did a collaborative project in Denmark in collaboration with the Technical University
of Denmark (DTU), Meggitt’s sensing systems
company, Ferroperm Piezoceramics A/S and the
world’s largest wind turbine manufacturer Vestas
Wind Systems A/S. DTU mainly develop integrated
modules, Ferroperm Piezoceramics produce the
miniature devices using its piezoceramic thick film
technology, while Vestas test the first prototypes in
their wind generators.
Cosworth Group (UK) (AM)
The group delivers technologies and capabilities in
mechanical and electronic engineering to a number
of sectors from automotive to aerospace. In energy
harvesting the focus is on kinetic energy harvesting.
Applied Nanodetectors Limited (UK) (IP)
Applied Nanodetectors Limited has developed a
sensor array platform than can be configured and
detect multiple species. This sensor array can be
integrated with mainstream semiconductor processes and manufactured at high volume. These
sensors arrays have all the attributes of nano
technology based sensors, high sensitivity, small
size and low power consumption. It is a potential
application for energy harvesting.
EADS Astrium (UK/EU) (AE)
EADS Astrium is an aerospace company with
strong presence in the UK. The interest to energy
harvesting comes from the need to used wireless
sensors in the testing process.
General Electric (USA/UK) (AE)
GE is a very diversified company and also a strong
player in the aerospace sector. The interest in energy harvesting is driven by wireless sensing needs.
25
AgustaWestland (UK/Italy) (AE)
The Anglo-Italian helicopter company owned by
Italy’s Finmeccanica is a total capability provider in
the vertical lift market. The needs in energy harvesting are similar to other aerospace companies.
Teledyne Defence Limited (UK) (AE)
Part of the Teledyne Technologies Group, the company is interested in energy harvesting for defense
and aerospace applications.
BAE Systems Plc (UK) (AE)
A large UK defense and aerospace company.
Jaltek Systems (UK) (AE)
Jaltek Systems is a technology solutions provider within the Jaltek Group, offering a integrated
design and manufacturing solutions tailored aerospace, defense and security.
Rolls-Royce (UK) (AE)
Honeywell (UK/Global) (IP)
Rolls-Royce is a global company, providing integrated power solutions for customers in civil and
defence aerospace, marine and energy markets.
Energy harvesting is an enabling technology for
Rolls-Royce to power wireless sensors.
Honeywell is a global sensing and automation company with over 7,000 employees in the UK working
in Aerospace, Automation and Control Solutions,
Performance Materials and Technologies and
Transportation Systems.
Honeywell is working closely with the ESP Community and has strong interest in wireless sensing and
energy harvesting.
Smart Fibres Ltd. (UK) (IS)
Protonex (USA/UK) (AE)
26
A UK SME that manufactures optical fiber strain
and temperature sensing solutions for structural
monitoring. Eliminating a battery or significantly
increasing the lifetime of it is the main driver for
energy harvesting adoption.
Protonex is a USA company listed on AIM London.
The company makes fuel cell power solutions for
portable, remote and mobile applications in the
100 to 1,000-watt range. Protonex has developed
several products designed for end-users in military,
commercial and consumer markets that are currently underserved by batteries and small generators. Products are also being developed for OEM
customers looking to integrate high-performance
fuel cell power into their products and applications.
Energy harvesting technologies could be used in
the lower power range as a complimentary source
of power.
Vantix Diagnostics (UK) (IP)
A biosensing company that developed a potentiometric technology for toxin, drug, contaminant,
protein or nucleic acid, in biological samples such
as blood, urine or saliva, or in other complex
samples such as milk, river water or homogenized
grain. The potential for energy harvesting is unclear
though a common value proposition of replacing
a battery or extending its life could benefit Vantix
technology.
Navetas Energy Management Ltd (UK) (IS)
The company is developing energy-metering solutions to consumers.
Clean Energy Prospector (UK/New Zealand) (IS)
The company offers automated meter reading solution with Bristol Power providing instant solar panel
fault notifications, feed-in-tariff submission and
engaging monitoring applications to homeowners.
Position Systems Ltd (UK) (HM)
PSL is a healthcare technology, applied electronics
and systems engineering company that provides
solutions to the health sector related to fall alerting,
infection control, cardiac monitoring, medication
monitoring and patient hydration etc.
Chemquip Ltd (UK) (IP)
The company is a supplier of parts and equipment
for chemical industry. Peter Cunningham from
Chemquip is actively participating in EH SIG activities and looking for collaborative partners. However, the interest in energy harvesting is general rather
than related to a specific challenge.
Lend Lease (UK/International) (IS)
The company is a large property and infrastructure
solutions provider.
SEA (UK) (IS)
SEA specialises in providing systems engineering
and specialist design solutions to Government and
Industry. The range of skills covers sensors, communications and high-integrity systems.
Parsons Brinckerhoff (UK/International) (IS)
Parsons Brinckerhoff is now a part of Balfour Beatty plc. The company is a global consulting firm
assisting public and private clients to plan, develop, design, construct, operate and maintain critical
infrastructure projects.
BPR Medical Ltd (UK) (HM)
The company makes medical gas control systems.
Aquamesh Technologies Ltd (UK) (AC)
The company is developing solutions for monitoring water usage in agriculture using low power
sensing networks.
27
Clearview Traffic Group Ltd (UK) (IS)
The company is developing and implementing integrated intelligent road safety and traffic monitoring
solutions. They have got competencies in delivering solar powered, minimally invasive real-time solutions. Energy harvesting is of interest where solar
power is not available.
Microsemi (USA/UK) (IP)
Ultra low power (ULP) wireless temperature sensors
can be designed from a combination of harvested
energy and a rechargeable battery. ULP wireless
sensor could be using Thermo Electric Generators
(TEG). The focus is on defense applications. The
company is also looking into structural health monitoring with energy harvesting in collaboration with
the University of Cardiff and Inteltech.
SmartLifeInc Ltd (UK) (HM)
SmartLife is a UK based technology company providing intelligent body monitoring garment technology for sports, health and emergency services
sectors.
Dstl (UK) (AE)
UK’s defense R&D lab, also a member of the EH
SIG’s steering group.
Omnisense Ltd. (UK) (IS)
Omnisense has developed a revolutionary Real
Time Locating System, which can accurately (1
metre or better under good conditions) track and
locate people, animals and physical assets without
the need for expensive pre-installed infrastructure.
Intel Research Labs Europe (UK) (IP)
Intel is a large international semiconductor manufacturer.
DeLaRue is the largest banknote printing company in the world. They have a very strong innovation culture and always look for new technologies
whether they are directly relevant or just tangentially fit into their technological ecosystem.
EDF Energy R&D Centre (UK) (IS)
EDF Energy is a large energy utility with interest in
energy harvesting related to the smart metering applications.
Oxford Technical Solutions (UK) (IS)
Allen-Vanguard (UK/USA) (AE)
Allen-Vanguard is security and defense technology
company specializing in electronic countermeasures.
OxTS designs and manufactures products combining Inertial Navigation and GPS/GNSS.
EA Technology (UK) (IS)
The company offers products and services to
power network operators.
GoSense Wireless Ltd (UK) (IS)
Provider of lltra low-power NFCv mobile sensors
with integral data logger and RFID compatible wireless interface.
Cloud Buildings (UK) (BA)
The company makes solar powered CO2 sensors
for the built environment.
Inteltech (UK) (IP)
No information about specific energy harvesting
applications, but there is evidence of strong interest in it through its involvement in a collaborative
project with Microsemi and Cardiff University.
Gas Sensing Solutions Ltd (UK) (BA)
A Scottish company that commercialized a lowpower optical CO2 sensor for built environment
monitoring. The company is actively seeking energy
harvesting technology to power its sensor. It is participating in TSB funded collaborative project with
Solar Press and Seamless Sensing.
Network Rail (UK) (R)
The company is operating a massive transport infrastructure, monitoring which would be easier with
energy harvesting.
Omnia 360 Ltd (UK) (AE)
Omnia 360 Ltd is a UK based security company
providing a wide range of products including laptop
safety, mobile safes and emergency lights.
Metasphere Ltd. (UK) (IS)
The company is delivering telemetry and control
solutions for remote assets. Increased battery life
or a complete replacement of it by energy harvesting would be very beneficial for this technology.
DeLaRue (UK/International) (IP)
28
Tribosonics Ltd (UK) (IP)
Speacialists in ultrasonic sensing for various industrial applications.
RingUK Ltd (UK) (IS)
A telecommunications company, which also offers
solutions for asset tracking and recovery.
Adaptive Wireless Solutions Ltd (UK) (IP)
Adaptive Wireless Solutions Ltd specialises in
industrial and commercial monitoring and control
solutions using wireless and other remote telemetry
systems.
29
Yorkshire Water Services (UK) (IP)
Interest in energy harvesting for environmental
monitoring.
Philips (UK/International) (HM)
A diversified electronics manufacturer with potential
interest in energy harvesting coming from different
areas including sensing.
Bombardier (UK/International) (R)
World’s only manufacturer of both planes and
trains.
BP (UK/International) (OG)
A large oil&gas company with huge needs for wireless autonomous sensing.
London Underground (UK) (R)
Transport infrastructure monitoring.
JLR (UK) (AM)
A large automotive manufacturer.
Centrica (UK) (IS)
A large utility company interested in smart metering.
General Motors (UK/US) (AM)
Another big automotive company with interest in
energy harvesting, which they presented at the recent Energy Harvesting EXPO 2013 in Santa Clara,
US, organized by IDTechEx. The company is represented in the UK by it’s brand Vauxhall.
A small group of the foreign companies, EH SIG members, is shown in the table below for reference purposes.
Company (Country)
Areas of Expertise
steute Schaltgeräte GmbH & Co. KG (Germany)
The company is developing and manufacturing
switchgear, sensors and control units for industrial
automation, medical equipment and building automation. They are using energy harvesting to power
some of their devices.
Micropelt (USA)
Micropelt is a maker of intelligent thermostatic
radiator valves (iTRVs) that communicate with
thermostats enabling single room temperature
management.
Esterline (USA)
Esterline is a specialized manufacturing company
principally serving aerospace and defense markets. Interest in energy harvesting is similar to other
aerospace and defense companies.
BMW (Germany)
Measurement Specialties (USA)
Global designer and manufacturer of sensors and
sensor-based systems offering custom designs for
OEM Applications. The company makes piezo film
sensors and vibration sensors, which makes it well
placed for adoption of energy harvesting technologies.
ITT (USA)
ITT is a manufacturer of parts and critical components and customized technology solutions for the
energy, transportation and industrial markets.
SPD Swiss Precision Diagnostics GmbH (Switzerland)
The company is specializing in the research, design, production and supply of advanced consumer
diagnostic products.
Elster-Instromet (Germany)
Elster-Instromet is a specialist company for Flow
Measurement & Control Equipment and Systems
focused on gas including smart metering, which a
popular energy harvesting application.
FMC Technologies, Inc. (USA)
The company provides technology solutions for the
energy industry including offshore and under-water
where autonomous sensing is critical.
Active Space Technologies (Portugal/Germany/
Netherlands)
Active Space Technologies is a provider of high
added-value products and services in the fields
of thermo-mechanical engineering (thermal and
structural analysis, fluid dynamics, design, high
precision manufacturing and testing), electronics
engineering (embedded systems, digital control).
Energy harvesting could be relevant to a number
of the above applications but we lack information
about specifics.
Micropelt is yet another early adopter of energy
harvesting.
UTC Aerospace Systems (USA)
30
Another large aerospace company (formerly Goodrich) with interest in energy harvesting and wireless sensing.
31
Analysis
Existing Collaborations
TSB Collaborations
The Technology Strategy Board funded a number of
collaborative projects in 2012:
1. Gas Sensing Solutions Ltd, Solar Press, Seamless
Sensing
2. GE Aviation Systems, University of Cambridge
3. Perpetuum Ltd, University of Southampton
4. Elster Metering Limited, Staffordshire University
5. Piezotag Limited, Severn Trent Water, Coventry
University
6. Molecular Solar Ltd., University of Warwick
7. Sharp Laboratories Of Europe Ltd, Highland Biosciences Ltd.
8. European Thermodynamics Ltd, University of
Glasgow
9. Smart Component Technologies Ltd, Network
Rail, Thales, Severn Unival
10. Microsemi, IntelTech, Cardiff University
The Metrology for Energy Harvesting
This European project is addressing the lack of accurate and standardised measurement that hinders
development, innovation and market acceptance of
EH devices. It helps to commercialise EH technologies by developing ‘traceable’ (can be traced back
to national standards) measurement methods, enabling industry and consumers to directly compare
different EH technologies such as thermoelectric
and vibrational harvesting devices.
The EnOcean Alliance
Supply Chain
The EnOcean Alliance, according to its website, now
totals 172 companies. In 2010, over 50 new member companies joined the consortium, resulting in 50
percent growth over 2009. The group is structured in
three tiers: promoters, participants and associates.
A number of companies in the are involved in the
EnOcean Alliance, most notably MK Electric, which
is a part of Honeywell.
Energy Harvesting SIG consisted of 364 individual members when the capability mapping exercise commenced. The EH
SIG membership is free and open to anyone interested in energy harvesting. This policy led to a diverse community of
academics and industry with many members being foreign researchers or companies. In addition to EH SIG membership,
128 UK members of the Energy Harvesting Group on Linkedin were reviewed as well as the UK members of the Energy
Harvesting Network. Relevant companies were mapped onto the supply chain:
- Energy Harvesting Components: 20
- Energy Harvesting Devices: 7
- Energy Harvesting Design and Consultancy: 23
The Electret Alliance: UK/Japan Consortium
- Industrial Applications and End Users: 52
A new collaboration has recently emerged in Japan.
The Electret Alliance was established in April 2013
as a partnership between industry and the academic
community to promote R&D, as well as to enhance
awareness and promote the propagation of the electret vibration generator. In the midst of global enthusiasm for energy harvesting, our electret vibration
generator has reached the stage of commercialization. One of the members is a UK company THHINK
Wireless Technologies. Other members are:
• The University of Tokyo
• Omron Corporation
• Asahi Glass Co.,Ltd :
• Techno Design Co.,Ltd
• Konishiyasu Co.,Ltd
FP7
A number of collaborative energy harvesting projects
involving industry were funded through the Framework Programme 7. UK was mainly represented by
universities in the FP7 projects.
The project involves metrology organisations from
Germany, UK, France, Finland, Slovenia, Italy and
Czech Republic. The UK is represented by NPL.
32
33
Academic research was identified at 28 UK universities, where a total of 224 senior researchers, postdocs and PhD students work in the area of energy
harvesting. It provides a robust and solid foundation
to the UK energy harvesting community. The bottleneck is in the area of commercial activities related
to energy harvesting devices. It could be explained
by a huge diversity and fragmentation of end-user
applications and their power requirements. With no
universal solution covering a substantial share of industry sectors, the business of making energy harvesting devices becomes risky. Only a few companies were successful in finding a profitable market
niche: a good example would be Perpetuum Ltd,
which makes energy harvesters for wireless monitoring of trains.
3. Solar
4. Thermal
5. Other technologies including electronic components and energy harvesting technologies that didn’t
fit into other categories
All major energy harvesting technologies such as vibration, motion, solar and heat were represented in
the sample group of technology providers with vibration energy harvesters using piezo materials and
DSSC for harvesting solar energy being the most
popular ones.
We can also observe a healthy number of collaborations involving researchers and companies from
different areas of the supply chain. However, none
of the TSB funded projects funded in 2012 included
designers of engineering consultancies. Bringing design and product development companies into collaborative projects potentially offers an opportunity
to bolster innovation and commercialisation in the
area of energy harvesting.
Components and Devices
The picture looks very balanced: with good numbers in each category. Though the thermal energy
harvesting may seem to be lagging behind, it is
represented by a very strong company, European
Thermodynamics Ltd, that already made significant
progress in productionising thermoelectric generators (TEGs).
Companies from these two groups demonstrate significant diversity in terms of energy harvesting technologies, which could be best summarised in the following five categories:
1. Materials for transduction and manufacturing
2. Piezo and other vibration energy harvesting technologies
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35
Industrial Applications: Sector Analysis
The investigation of the need in industry for wireless solutions and the exploration of the potential for these to be
powered by energy harvesting was carried out by application sector. A set of 9 different sectors originally were examined in the “Industry Needs Analysis: Potential opportunities for energy harvesting” published by the EH SIG in
May 2013. These are:
Sector
Number of Companies
Aerospace
12
Agriculture
1
Automotive
3
Building automation
2
Health & Medical
4
Industrial process control & monitoring
11
Infrastructure & structural monitoring
15
Oil & gas
1
Rail
3
The same sectors were applied to the list of companies in the End Users and Industrial Applications
category.
Three sectors emerged as clear leaders, as shown
below: Infrastructure & Structural Monitoring, Aerospace and Industrial Process Control & Monitoring.
The Aerospace sector also includes companies,
which specialise in defence and security applications, which partly explain the high number. For example Dstl was placed in this category because it is
the best fit among all sectors in the list. It is interesting to note that although the building automation
sector is the most developed area for commercial
energy harvesting this is not strongly represented in
36
the UK. The sector is very strong in Europe, in particular in Germany, and represents an opportunity to
build awareness of practical application here in the
UK.
Energy Harvesting Clusters
Two technology clusters were identified in this report.
One cluster formed around the University of Southampton. A number of energy harvesting technologies developed at this university were successfully
commercialised, which led to formation of a number of companies still geographically based near the
university. Geographical proximity to Southampton
enables them to continue collaborating with the academics on developing new technologies or improving the existing ones.
The Cambridge cluster is slightly bigger but less
monolithic and includes companies from all components of the supply chain with some companies
having no relation to the University of Cambridge in
terms of their origins.
37
EH SIG Community
Activities
Energy Harvesting Network
PowerMEMS 2013
The Energy Harvesting Network is a network of UK
academic and industrial researchers and end-users
of energy harvesting technologies and was originally
funded by EPSRC. Its website states that at January
2014 there were:
03 Dec 2013
• 271 members from 179 academic institutions currently registered with the Energy Harvesting Network
Energy Harvesting Mission USA
• 136 members from 156 companies currently registered with the Energy Harvesting Network.
Activities of the Energy Harvesting Network have
been focused on defining new research challenges
through roadmapping activities and helping catalyse collaborative research proposals. It also disseminates information about the current and future
capabilities of energy harvesting technologies to all
potential users in both industry and academia. This
dissemination activity, through its annual event, is its
primary focus now that EPSRC funding has ended.
Cambridge Cluster:
Southampton Cluster:
University of Cambridge
University of Southampton
pragmatIC Printing Ltd
Ilika Plc
Eight19 Ltd
Perpetuum
Plextek Ltd
Synapse Electronics
Sentec Ltd
Sagentia
IDTechEx
The 13th International Conference on Micro and
Nanotechnology for Power Generation and Energy
Conversion Applications
20 Nov 2013
UK Energy Harvesting Mission to Japan
16 Jul 2013
Energy Harvesting & Storage Europe 2013
17 Apr 2013 - 18Apr 2013
Energy Harvesting 2013
25 March 2013
The Energy Harvesting Network has a common interest with the EH SIG in dissemination although its
focus is primarily on the academic community. The
two organisations therefore already work closely to
coordinate plans and collaborate on various activities such as energy harvesting themed events for industry and academia. The EH SIG has a much greater focus on the development of the supply chain
for energy harvesting recognising the UK academic
strenght at the beginning of this.
Events
The EH SIG organises a number of events to benefit
the energy harvesting community . Several examples
are listed below:
3rd UK-Japan Energy Harvesting Workshop
06 Dec 2013
TTP
Ronsek Innovation
38
39
Energy Harvesting SWOT
Analysis
40