Life-Cycle and Techno-Economic Assessment of a Wind-Powered Triboelectric Nanogenerator for Low-Power Applications

This study presents a functional, techno-economic, and life-cycle assessment of a wind-driven triboelectric nanogenerator for off-grid, ultra-low-power sensing. A Van de Graaff-inspired belt device was tested under controlled airflow using capacitor-charging measurements, and its performance was evaluated together with cost and environmental indicators. The results show that stored energy increased with wind speed over the tested range, then approached saturation at higher airflow due to turbulence and mechanical losses. The best within-window performance was obtained with the intermediate storage capacitance under the reference operating condition. Techno-economic analysis indicates that the current prototype is not competitive with conventional electricity generators; instead, its main practical value lies in battery displacement and reduced maintenance for intermittent sensing nodes, while the levelized cost of energy is useful only as a secondary normalization metric. The life-cycle assessment indicates substantial material circularity and a short carbon payback period. Overall, the device is most suitable for distributed monitoring, precision agriculture, and similar applications where low maintenance and intermittent autonomous operation are more important than bulk electricity generation.