A self-regulated wind energy harvester with automatic mode transition strategy enabled by wind-induced centrifugal force

Abstract Natural wind energy distributes over a wide speed range, but conventional wind turbines with high electrical damping can only work under relatively high wind speeds, whereas breeze harvesters with low electrical damping suffer from limited electric outputs despite their low start-up wind speeds. To solve this dilemma, we report herein an automatic mode transition (AMT) strategy for rotary wind energy harvesters (WEHs) to realize self-regulation of electrical damping according to ambient wind speeds. The superior performance achieved with the AMT strategy has been demonstrated through an AMT-WEH comprising a low-damping as well as a high-damping power generation units. Theoretical analysis and experimental tests reveal that the AMT-WEH not only can work in low-damping single-unit mode to harvest weak wind (⩾2.6 m s −1 ), but also can switch spontaneously to high-damping dual-unit mode to efficiently capture strong wind. As connected with matched electrical loads, the AMT-WEH can switch to dual-unit mode and generate high average power of 188.2 mW under 8.2 m s −1 wind, which is more than 11.5-fold increase as compared with that (16.3 mW) of a conventional WEH without the AMT design. This study demonstrates a distinctive AMT strategy for WEHs to effectively exploit wide-speed-range wind energy toward self-contained sensors and electronics.