Previous research had shown that around 40% of the fuel energy, gets wasted through the exhaust pipes in a car. This project is to create a waste-heat utilization system for a car, which is focused on utilizing the waste heat emitted through the exhaust pipe. The basic design prototype has a Stirling engine to transfer heat to mechanical energy and then generate electricity by using magnets and coils in a generator taken from a LED flashlight. As the waste heat is converted to electricity, the efficiency of a car will be improved.
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TEAM 12: DEVELOPMENT OF AN ARDUINO-BASED THERMOSTAT WITH A VENTILATOR THAT HARNESSES THERMAL ENERGY7/1/2017 With the improvements in quality of life, air conditioning systems have been widely accepted in public areas and houses. Given that the energy consumed by air conditioning accounts for a large portion of household energy use, it is crucial for engineers to develop a method that improves the energy efficiency of air conditioning devices. The daily temperature variation is significant in many areas, which means a large amount of thermal energy is not used effectively. It is technically feasible to improve the energy efficiency of air conditioning by storing the thermal energy in cold air at night, and use it during daytime to cool down the house. The opposite process can also be used to improve the efficiency of space heating. The objective of our project is to design an Arduino-based ventilation system that takes advantage of thermal energy and reduce the electricity consumption of air conditioning. In this project, a ventilation system is designed to store thermal energy in an insulated tank at daytime and to use it to warm up air at night. An air pump and a temperature sensor are controlled by Arduino Uno. By harnessing natural thermal energy, the efficiency of air conditioning and space heating can be improved.
Opening, closing, and going through doors can be challenging for elderly people and individuals with disabilities. To ease the transition of physically challenged people through doorways, automatic doors are being implemented in almost every modern building. When the individual presses a wall mounted switch or a button to door(s) will automatically open and then reclose.
When opening and closing doors humans provide energy to the door for it to rotate. After the door has opened, that energy is wasted. Many existing models of automatic doors use an external electrical energy source. But this energy consumption can be reduced by harnessing the energy provided to the door by people who are capable of opening it, storing the energy and using that same energy to power the door to open automatically. Previous research has shown electrical energy can be harnessed from the rotational energy of the door to supply energy to an electronic lock on the same door. However, no research has focused on storing the kinetic energy of a door’s rotation, and then using it to open the door. Our research aim is to produce a prototype of a system that can help reduce electric energy consumption in automatic doors by means of storing the kinetic energy applied to door in the form of electric energy, then use it to assist physically challenged individuals through the door. |