Potential of Power Generation Utilizing Waste Kinetic Energy from Vehicles

Wail Adaileh, Khaled Al-Qdah, Mayyas Mahasneh

Mechanical Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering (Madinah Munawrah), Taibah University, KSA..
Mechanical Engineering Department, Tafila Technical University, Tafila, Jordan.

DOI: 10.4236/sgre.2012.32015                

Abstract

Energy generation has seen significant development in recent years. This investigation describes a new technique for generating energy from the waste kinetic energy of the vehicles at low speed. A complete description of the system is presented including the general concept, configurations, mechanical design, and electrical system. The system based on the principle of drum rotation due to low movement or transportation of the vehicles driven at low speed at different places such as moles, hotels, universities entrance and fast meals gates. The results show that this new technology could provide an efficient and low cost method of generating electricity from vehicles and the generated electricity has been utilized for different types of applications and mainly for street lighting, domestic uses such as air conditioning, lighting, heating. Some major factors have been studied and practically designed and tested such as there is no possibility to failure or yielding of shaft under loading and the drum is more strength to bending and other forms of stress. It was found through this work that the generated electricity of system and under Jordanian climate conditions can be utilized for electrical and the vehicles waste kinetic energy is one of the renewable sources of energy which can be harnessed to generate electricity. This system depends on the vehicle’s weight, when the weight increase the rpm of the drum will increase. As the horizontal vehicle speed is increased the rotational speed of the drum will be increased. It was found that the effective rotational drum speed (n = 35 rpm) at which the system starts to charging. The friction between the tire and the drum increases when the vehicle weight increases. The reported results indicated that we need only about 10% of vehicle attractive effort to generating a sizable amount of electrical energy. Also, the testing results proven that the minimum effective vehicle’s speed is 20 Km/hr, this means that all of the vehicle going over the system can be harnesses to produce the energy. The suggested model will be able to generate energy may be economically feasible to use for a larger applications, and thus helps to reduce the costs of energy production. On the practical side we have been able to produce and store electrical energy using this model at minimum speed of 20 km/hr, and the system is considered simple to install, inexpensive compared with other sources, safe, and has no bad impacts on the environment. Also, the system can be modified and subjected to upgrading. The system total cost was found to be about US $900 and this is an extra motivation to use this system.

Keywords

Harvesting; Waste Energy; Vehicle; Generator; Kinetic Energy; Electrical Power; Drum

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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