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ABSTRACT
This seminar is all about generating electricity when people walk on the Floor. Think about the forces you
exert which is wasted when a person walks. The idea is to convert this force to electrical energy. The Power
Generating floor intends to translate the kinetic energy to the electrical power. Energy Crisis is the main
issue of world these days.
The motto of this research work is to face this crisis somehow. Though it won’t meet the requirement of
electricity but as a matter of fact if we are able to design a power generating floor that can produce 100W
on just 12 steps, then for 120 steps we can produce 1000 Watt and if we install such type of 100 floors with
this system then it can produce 1MegaWatt. Which itself is an achievement to make it significant

CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
Energy is very important in today's world. For example, we use different energy sources to generate the
electricity we need for our homes, schools, businesses and factories. Electricity powers our TVs,
computers, air conditioners, cell phones and washing machines - just to mention a few. We also use energy
to run cars, planes, trains, buses and motorcycles. Energy harvesting also known as power harvesting or
energy scavenging is the process by which energy is derived from external sources e.g. solar power,
thermal energy, wind energy, salinity gradients ,and kinetic energy, captured, and stored for small, wireless
autonomous devices, like those used in wearable electronics and wireless sensor networks. Energy
harvesters provide a very small amount of power for low energy electronics. While the input fuel to some
large scale generation costs money (oil, coal, etc.), the energy source for energy harvesters is present as
ambient background and is free. For example, temperature gradients exist from the operation of a
combustion engine and in urban areas, there is a large amount of electromagnetic energy in the
environment because of radio and television broadcasting.
Walking is the most common activity in day to day life. When a person walks, he loses energy to the road
surface in the form of impact, vibration, sound etc, due to the transfer of his weight on to the road surface,
through foot falls on the ground during every step. This energy can be tapped and converted in the usable
form such as in electrical form
With that in mind investments are being made in the popular green energy sectors such as wind, solar,
and wave energy. However, people’s steps (thousands upon thousands a day) utilize and channel kinetic
energy too.

1.1 Objective
The objective of this study is to find the feasibility of power generation from footsteps.
CHAPTER 2
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
2.1 General
With the electronic devices becoming integral part of day-to-day life, both in personal and industrial
environments, the demand for energy is tremendously increasing across the globe. In the effort to find
alternative sources to supplement the conventional energy sources, the energy industry has found the
feasibility in fossil fuels, nuclear, thermal, hydro, solar etc. Human body generates a lot of energy while
doing the most-common activity - walking. Every foot fall causes pressure when the foot hits the floor, which
goes untapped. With the ground surface engineered to harvest the energy, power can be generated from
the human footfalls, stored and used as a power source or even fed to the power grid. For instance, a
person dancing on an energy harvesting floor can generate 5-10 watts; in a packed dance club, the
production can meet up to 60% of the total energy required for the club.
There are few methods to generate electrical energy from footsteps. Power would be generated
by footsteps of crowd on the floor.

2.2 Footfall energy harvesting floor

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An emerging startup called Pavegen has installed such squares of energy-generating pavement
in London. In an effort to keep the production of the pavement as green and sustainable as possible,
Pavegen partnered with Ryburn Rubber Limited and Advanced LEDs (which has also invested in the idea)
to make sure that its components create as small an environmental impact as possible.The average square
of pavement produces about 2.1 watts of electricity. And according to Pavegen, any one square of
pavement in a high-foot traffic area can see 50,000 steps a day. Based on this data, only five units of
Pavegen pavement can be enough to keep the lights on at a bus stop all night .
And while the power producing platform is over crowded with moving population, energy is produced
at larger levels. Pavegen isn’t targeting its product exclusively at municipalities. One of its big ideas is to
have stores located on busy sidewalks install them in front of their locations to power their signage or any
internal electronics. To encourage this adoption, the company says it will brand its slabs for its commercial
customers. The slabs installed in East London happen to be green (thus suggesting its clean-tech solution)
but they come in a variety of colors . The company believes the embedded lamp is important to inform
passersby of their contribution to the clean energy movement.
An emerging technology in the industry is the footfall energy harvesting floor, which generates energy from
the routine human activities, such as walking, running, jumping, dancing etc. The technology works on the
basic principle of converting kinetic energy, obtained from the pressure applied on the floor surface, into
electrical energy. The “footfall energy harvesting floor” comprises a floor covering that encloses a
transducer mechanism for converting the applied pressure into electrical energy and a means for
transmitting the electrical energy for storage or load consumption. Among the other technologies that
promote sustainable energy, energy harvesting floor is considered to be the most productive as it does not
depend on any of the natural resources, such as wind, water or sun that are not consistently available.
Energy harvesting floors, which take input from human footsteps without affecting pedestrians’ normal life,
are easy to install, environment friendly, and are truly sustainable.

2.3 Experiments with energy harvesting floors

Researches and developers have experimented on footfall energy harvesting floors to study their
feasibility, reliability and effectiveness. Constant experiments have been carried out in the East Japan
railway stations, streets of Toulouse and West Ham underground station over a period of varying durations,
ranging from several weeks to few years. These experiments have provided evidences that energy
harvesting tiles are robust, practical and can be used as an alternative source of producing energy. Post
the initial success, improvements are being made and tested for enhanced power generation performance
and capacity, along with advancements in material durability. The energy thus captured can be used to
power streetlights, pedestrian crossing lights, bus stop displays, traffic signals, automatic ticket gates in
stations, information displays etc. Dance clubs around the globe have piloted the footfall energy harvesting
floors belonging to the prototype concept - "Crowd Farm", in which energy from footfalls of clubbers dancing
on the floors is collected and used to power LED lights and, in the long-term plan, fed into the club's power
grid.

2.4 Different technology behind the energy floors

With this method energy harvesting proving its feasibility, developers of energy harvesting floors
concentrating their efforts find the most-efficient way of harvesting energy from footfalls. To popularize and
establish this technology among varied consumer segment, inventors have already initiated marketing of
their products, which has been well received by environmental activists. Based on the mechanism used for
converting the kinetic energy into electrical energy, footfall energy harvesting floors can be broadly
classified into the following categories:
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Source: Wikipedia
Fig.2.1. Different methods for power generation from footsteps
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Table 2.1 Different methods for power generation from footsteps

2.4.1 Piezoelectric method for power generation

Though various kinds of footfall energy harvesting technologies exist, piezoelectric is the
commonly-used technology. It generates energy from external force impulses or vibration in flooring,
bridges, roads and structures. This system can produce energy even with consistent or predictable
vibrational frequency. With its ability to leverage any kind of force, stress or strain, it is ideal for different
applications, and hence has a widening market potential.
Though, power generated using piezoelectric systems are predominantly in cigar lighters, they
have found applications in wireless sensors and various portable electronics.
However, the varying or inconsistent vibrational frequency range limits the practicality for certain
applications.This device, if embedded in the footpath, can convert foot impact energy into electrical form.
The working principle is simple. When a pedestrian steps on the topplate of the device, the plate will dip
down slightly due to the weight of the pedestrian. The downward movement of the plate results in rotation
of the shaft of an electrical alternator, fitted in the device, to produce electrical energy. The top plate reverts
back to its original position due to negating springs provided in the device. If such devices are embedded
in places where there is continuous human traffic such as in city malls, railway platforms, city footpaths etc.,
the electricity generated from these devices can be used for street lights.
The greatest attraction of this technique is that in order to generate electrical power using footsteps
one step will be enough at this level to produced electrical energy. The piezo electric method can be
approached as a fly and gear wheel mechanism. Following are the steps of fly and gear wheel method.
First step is by proper arrangement of electrical system. After the arrangement of electrical
system which transforms mechanical energy to electrical energy, When a human steps on the device due
to his/her body weight the iron plate moves downwards and drives the crank shaft which further drives the
gear arrangements which further drives fly wheel. Then there is another gear arrangement which is
connected to the commentator of the dynamometer. The load is applied in the iron plate, Power is
produced. Then the voltage that produced through steps is rectified and after battery charger circuit this
D.C voltage is stored in the lead acid battery of 12 volt. This lead acid battery is further attached to the
inverter. The invert is designed such that it inverts the voltage from battery which is 12 volt D.C to 230 volt
A.C. So this A.C voltage is used in different appliances such as for charging the laptop battery and also to
charge the handset, it can also be used to lightening up through energy saver. In order to produce more
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power the number or footsteps can be increased and also the ability of battery and inverter should be
increased, then output power will also be increased.

CHAPTER 3
METHODOLOGY
The piezoelectric effect is understood as the linear electro-mechanical interaction between the
mechanical and the electrical state in crystalline materials with no inversion symmetry. The piezoelectric
effect is a reversible process in that materials exhibiting the direct piezoelectric effect (the internal
generation of electrical charge resulting from an applied mechanical force) also exhibit the reverse
piezoelectric effect (the internal generation of a mechanical strain resulting from an applied electrical field).

Fig.3.1 Piezoelectric principle

Source: www.ijsrp.org

Fig.3.2. Working principle

Source: www.irjset.com

3.1 Methodology
The nature of the piezoelectric effect is closely related to the occurrence of electric dipole moments
in solids. The latter may either be induced for ions on crystal lattice sites with asymmetric charge
surroundings or may directly be carried by molecular groups. The dipole density or polarization
(dimensionality [cm/m3]) may easily be calculated for crystals by summing up the dipole moments per
volume of the crystallographic unit cell. As every dipole is a vector, the dipole density P is a vector field.
Dipoles near each other tend to be aligned in regions called Weiss domains. The domains are usually
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randomly oriented, but can be aligned using the process of poling (not the same as magnetic poling), a
process by which a strong electric field is applied across the material, usually at elevated temperatures.
One of the decisive importance for the piezoelectric effect is the change of polarization P when
applying a mechanical stress. This might either be caused by a reconfiguration of the dipole-inducing
surrounding or by re-orientation of molecular dipole moments under the influence of the external stress.

Fig.3.3. Mechanism of kinetic footfall

Source:www.un-spider.org

3.1.1 Mechanical Stress

Here the mechanical stress is considered as the weight of the footsteps per unit area. The weight
of the footsteps due to gravity is converted into mechanical rotation. stress is a physical quantity that
expresses the internal forces that neighboring particles of a continuous material exert on each other. For
example, when a solid vertical bar is supporting a weight, each particle in the bar pulls on the particles
immediately above and below it. When a liquid is under pressure, each particle gets pushed inwards byall
the surrounding particles, and, in reaction, pushes them outwards. These macroscopic forces are actually
the average of a very large number of intermolecular forces and collisions between the molecules in those
particles. Stress inside a body may arise by various mechanisms, such as reaction to external forces applied
to the bulk material (like gravity) or to its surface (like contact forces, external pressure, or friction). Any
strain (deformation) of a solid material generates an internal elastic stress, analogous to the reaction force
of a spring that tends to restore the material to its original undeformed state. In liquids and gases, only
deformations that change the volume generate persistent elastic stress. However, if the deformation is
gradually changing with time, even in fluids there will usually be some viscous stress, opposing that change.
Elastic and viscous stresses are usually combined under the name mechanical stress.
Future Aspects
In future aspects we can use this principal in the speed breakers at high ways where are rushes of
the vehicles too much thus increase input torque and ultimate output of generator. If this project is
implemented at very busy stairs palace then we produce efficient useful electrical for large purpose.

4.4 Advantages
 To store the electricity in battery.
 It can be use at any time when it necessary.
 Easy construction.
 Less number of parts required.
 Electricity can used for many purposes
4.5 Applications
 In street light.
 In LED light for specific purposes.
 In air circulation system for room by the small fans.
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 For used in security alarm

 This can be implemented on railway station to generate elec-tric power.
 In bus station.
 In car parking system.
 In Airports.
 In Lift system.
 In car lifting system.
 Electric escalators

 CHAPTER 5
 CONCLUSION
 In order to overcome the energy crises problem and also contribute to create a healthy
global environmental change, this technique need to be widely implemented. Thus this is
a promising technology to provide efficient solution to power crisis to affordable extent.
This will be the most acceptable means of providing power to the places that involves
difficulties of transmission. Moreover walking across power producing platform will be a
fun for idle people who can improve their health by exercising in such platforms with
earning. The electrical energy generated at such farms will be useful for nearby
applications. This technology would facilitate the future creation of new urban landscapes,
athletic fields with a spectator area, music halls, theaters, nightclubs and a large gathering
space for rallies, demonstrations and celebrations, railway stations, bus stands, subways,
airports etc. like capable of harnessing human locomotion for electricity generation.
Though being advantageous in several aspects, such as manufacturing, installation,
aesthetics, maintenance, availability etc, this technology can only contribute to low power
applications. It requires highly-efficient converter mechanism and storage devices and has
a less storage lifespan. Besides, the materials used in manufacturing the devices must be
highly durable, as they will be operating throughout the year. As of today, this technology
is in its nascent stages due to the above stated reasons. Development in the areas of storage
and transmission of energy may eliminate all the drawbacks and make this an effective
technology for power harvesting.
 This type of technology may be well suited to other applications though. One potential
application would be to connect one of these tiles directly to a low consumptions device.
A few examples of such devices are a vending machine or a parking pass dispenser. A
customer would walk or drive up the machine and depress the pad. This may be able to
generate enough power to run the device for the very short period of time that it is in use.
It would take very little power for a vending machine to push a candy bar forward or a
machine to push out a parking pass. Another potential use of pavegen tiles would be
education and awareness. Being "carbon neutral" or "energy neutral" is very much in style
these days. These tiles could be implemented temporarily for major sporting events,
festivals, concerts or similar things. The goal here would not be to save money. Instead,
the event could advertise that it is not using any electricity from the grid. These days, that
is a rather cool thing for an event to brag about. This could be a very effective way to create
dialog and awareness of related energy issues.
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