Lit the Olympic LED by "power floor tiles"

First look at the picture.

Here is a fierce battle going on the London Olympic Games main station is one of the commonly used West Ham station. The photo is a temporary corridor leading to the opening ceremony of the stadium, the Olympic Village, the International Broadcasting Center in the giant Park Olympic Park.

Please pay attention to see the passage of the flashing 12 tiles, in fact, this is a light LED can be lit after the stampede". The conversion of kinetic energy to electric energy is realized by using piezoelectric element. This technique is called energy harvesting technology, is currently the focus of attention of all parties.

But there's a place where the West Ham station is puzzling. Because the operation of the Olympic Games 72MJ (Olympic DELivery Authority) at a news conference, said, during the Olympic Games, the power generation of these power floor tiles will reach 20kWh. And they said, "these are enough to make a small electric car track 397 miles along the track and field track of the Olympic Games, or to charge up to 10 thousand phones within 1 hours. The use of these power floor tiles, trails can be achieved 24 hours of lighting, the remaining power can be stored in rechargeable batteries".

Energy acquisition misunderstanding"

However, the official release of electricity generation is actually difficult to achieve.

Energy harvesting is the technology and device for the purpose of generating electricity, I think this idea is a misunderstanding of energy harvesting technology". Energy acquisition is not the focus of the power generation itself, but the use of the system can save the product to replace the disposable batteries, wiring, maintenance trouble.

The performance of small and large products can be improved

In the process of putting energy into practical use, the accumulator is one of the most important devices. Thin lithium ion rechargeable batteries and the recent development of energy harvesting double layer capacitor (EDLC) has come out. Seiko Electronics (SII) has achieved a EDLC product, the product's internal resistance is less than the previous product 1/3, leakage current is only about 1/10 of previous products. Mass production was started in July 2012, with an annual output of 5 million.

In fact, EDLC performance improvement is not limited to small products. For example, the Japanese Chemi-Con company to its EDLC "DLCAP" new product - "DXE" series to reduce the internal resistance of the company's products in the past half of the following. Moreover, the lithium ion capacitors are also improved, JM Energy on the development of the internal resistance of only the previous product 1/3 ULTIMO new products.

Advantages of small internal resistance

With the improvement of performance, the application scope of super capacitor is steadily expanding. Which is the most representative of Mazda is scheduled for 2012 listed vehicles equipped with the deceleration energy regeneration system "i-ELOOP" will use EDLC. In addition to the automotive sector, the combination of EDLC and renewable energy is also noteworthy.

In the photo below, you can see a solar PV panel near the entrance to the building.

This is the LED street lamp solar panel and EDLC set the Tokyo University Agricultural & Technology Koganei campus combining attention angle of photovoltaic panels installed photovoltaic panels, and keep the ground vertically, it seemed to realize free maintenance, prevent the accumulation of leaves and rubbish. In cold areas, this is also the effect of anti snow.

However, compared with the angle of the solar panels, the solar power generation efficiency is low. If the power is small, the power loss will increase when the lithium ion rechargeable battery with internal resistance is used to store electricity.

At this time will play a role in the super capacitor, because its internal resistance is much smaller than the lithium-ion rechargeable battery, so only the low voltage can be fully loaded storage. The advantages of small internal resistance can also be reflected in the frequent charging and discharging. From this point of view, said, lithium ion rechargeable battery is the best large capacity storage devices is still too early.