Self-Power Digital Pipe Flow Metering

The objective of this study is to develop a digital and battery-free smart pipe-flow-meter. Three major technologies made this possible: a cog-resistance-free generator with high efficiency, an effective methodology to extract its energy and a low power consumption metering system, for a new generation of flow meters. In the system, a tiny portion of the kinetic energy from the fluid/air flow was extracted, stored in a capacitor and used. The resistance to the flow was negligible because of the very low power consumption as well as the coreless generator technology. Feasibility was demonstrated through the experiments: for air flowing in an 11mm pipe, 18 seconds of energy harvesting at 10 revolution-per-second (RPS) turbine speed, generated enough power for the flow meter to operate for 720 seconds at 20 RPS, without battery or any external power.