Events as Power Source: Wireless Sustainable Corrosion Monitoring

• Main Authors: Guodong Sun, Guofu Qiao, Lin Zhao, Zhibo Chen
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2013-12-01
• Series: Sensors
• Subjects: wireless sensor; corrosion monitoring; energy harvesting
• Online Access: http://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/13/12/17414

This study presents and implements a corrosion-monitoring wireless sensor platform, EPS (Events as Power Source), which monitors the corrosion events in reinforced concrete (RC) structures, while being powered by the micro-energy released from the corrosion process. In EPS, the proposed corrosion-sensing device serves both as the signal source for identifying corrosion and as the power source for driving the sensor mote, because the corrosion process (event) releases electric energy; this is a novel idea proposed by this study. For accumulating the micro-corrosion energy, we integrate EPS with a COTS (Commercial Off-The-Shelf) energy-harvesting chip that recharges a supercapacitor. In particular, this study designs automatic energy management and adaptive transmitted power control polices to efficiently use the constrained accumulated energy. Finally, a set of preliminary experiments based on concrete pore solution are conducted to evaluate the feasibility and the efficacy of EPS.