Design of a hybrid input charge-pump using micropower thermoelectric generators

For industrial wireless transmitters, a hybrid input charge-pump utilizing thermoelectric energy from waste heat is proposed in this paper. Unlike conventional inductor-based converters, the proposed capacitor-based converter supplies energy to a wireless transmitter by using thermoelectric power source in combination with rechargeable battery source. Through theoretical analyses, simulations and experiments, the following results are shown: 1. Even if the voltage of TEG is small, the proposed converter can provide the sufficient voltage to power a wireless transmitter by compensating the insufficient voltage of TEG with the battery voltage. 2. The formulas obtained by the theoretical analyses are useful for designing the proposed converter, because the theoretical results agreed well with the simulation results. 3. The proposed converter is implementable onto an IC chip, because the layout design of the proposed converter is shown.