Cymbet, Konarka Demonstrate Flexible Solar Energy Harvesting for Autonomous Sensors

Cymbet Corporation and Konarka Technologies are combining their unique solar energy capture, energy conversion and energy storage technologies to demonstrate advanced solar energy harvesting techniques. These techniques enable new applications such as zero power intelligent building energy management wireless sensors, agricultural field monitoring/reporting devices and shipment status data loggers. This innovative demo will be featured at the Embedded Systems Conference (ESC), in San Jose, CA, March 30 – April 2 in Cymbet’s booth 436.

The key to creating cost effective energy harvesting-based sensors and controls is to use power train components that can be optimized for the application. Cymbet’s and Konarka’s ESC demo highlights the innovative features of both companies’ technologies. Cymbet is a leader in solid state energy storage devices and energy harvesting technology. Konarka is the leading developer of polymer-based, organic photovoltaic (OPV) technology that provides a source of renewable power in a variety of form factors. The Konarka Power Plastic solar plastic film converts light to energy anywhere using a flexible format that is utilized in this energy harvesting demo.

“Our Power Plastic technology is lightweight, flexible and adaptable for use in many energy harvesting applications,” said Dan Williams, vice president of business development at Konarka. “This particular demo illustrates Power Plastic deployed in a cylindrical shape that powers a wireless sensor via the Cymbet EnerChip EH power module.”

Cymbet recently introduced the new EnerChip EH CBC5300 energy harvesting power module that connects to the flexible Konarka Power Plastic photo voltaic cell in this demo. The CBC5300 utilizes EnerChip solid state energy cells, and combines energy conversion, energy storage and power management into a small footprint module.

“The new EnerChip EH module provides significant advantages to our customers. Integrating the EnerChip and high efficiency energy harvesting circuitry into a single module provides many new ways to create zero power devices”, said Bill Priesmeyer, Cymbet CEO. “Combining the EnerChip EH module with Konarka’s state-of-the-art photovoltaic technology demonstrates new innovative energy harvesting storage solutions.”

Creating power efficient and cost effective solar energy harvesting power solutions is a complex task. There are many variables that must be taken into account. The Konarka Power Plastic and Cymbet EnerChip EH combination shows how new technologies may be utilized to create drop-in power solutions. Designers will be able to create flexible photovoltaic configurations that connect to a single power module. The EnerChip EH module has >5000 recharge cycles, low self-discharge, stable output voltage, and can be connected to many different microcontrollers and low power wireless devices.