Multistage coupling water-enabled electric generator with customizable energy output

Puying Li, Yajie Hu, Wenya He, Bing Lu, Haiyan Wang, Huhu Cheng () and Liangti Qu ()
Additional contact information
Puying Li: Tsinghua University
Yajie Hu: Tsinghua University
Wenya He: Tsinghua University
Bing Lu: Tsinghua University
Haiyan Wang: Tsinghua University
Huhu Cheng: Tsinghua University
Liangti Qu: Tsinghua University

Nature Communications, 2023, vol. 14, issue 1, 1-9

Abstract: Abstract Constant water circulation between land, ocean and atmosphere contains great and sustainable energy, which has been successfully employed to generate electricity by the burgeoning water-enabled electric generator. However, water in various forms (e.g. liquid, moisture) is inevitably discharged after one-time use in current single-stage water-enabled electric generators, resulting in the huge waste of inherent energy within water circulation. Herein, a multistage coupling water-enabled electric generator is proposed, which utilizes the internal liquid flow and subsequently generated moisture to produce electricity synchronously, achieving a maximum output power density of ~92 mW m−2 (~11 W m−3). Furthermore, a distributary design for internal water in different forms enables the integration of water-flow-enabled and moisture-diffusion-enabled electricity generation layers into mc-WEG by a “flexible building blocks” strategy. Through a three-stage adjustment process encompassing size control, space optimization, and large-scale integration, the multistage coupling water-enabled electric generator realizes the customized electricity output for diverse electronics. Twenty-two units connected in series can deliver ~10 V and ~280 μA, which can directly lighten a table lamp for 30 min without aforehand capacitor charging. In addition, multistage coupling water-enabled electric generators exhibit excellent flexibility and environmental adaptability, providing a way for the development of water-enabled electric generators.

Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-41371-x Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:14:y:2023:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-023-41371-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-41371-x

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().