Design of an efficient solar energy harvesting system for wireless power communication

This paper proposes the design of an efficient ambient solar energy harvesting (SEH) system with enhanced protection for low-power devices. The proposed SEH system is designed and fabricated on a 1.6 mm Flame Retardant 4 (FR4) substrate using EasyEDA software. The harvester consists of a 3 W monocrystalline solar panel, a solar charger module with maximum power point tracking, a lithium-ion rechargeable battery and a battery protection integrated circuit, and a DC-DC converter. Each of the SEH system component modules is optimized for better performance. The proposed energy harvester achieves a peak power conversion efficiency of 81.22% with a total output power of 2.35 W by using a CN3791 battery charger module. This approach is cost-effective, highly sustainable, and virtually maintenance-free. It can be deployed in various low-powered devices such as wireless sensor network nodes and Internet of Things microcontrollers to extend their battery lifetimes, thereby achieving environmental-friendly and sustainable energy harvesting.