International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 8887)

Volume 100 No.1 Au!ust "01#

EMBEDDED SYSTEM POWERED PURELY BY
HARVESTED ENERGY
JAI SINGH
Department of Electronics and
Communication Engineering
AL-FALAH UNIVERSITY Dhouj,
Faridabad, Haryana 121004,
India
zaismac@hotmail.com
ABSTRACT
This paper deals with the design approach for embedded
systems with limited power resources. The focus is on
embedded systems powered purely by energy harvested from
the surroundings. Real-time operation and power consumption
are critical design aspects of these systems.
A number of design problems are discussed and solutions are
presented.
General Terms
Architecture model of embedded system, Microelectronics,
harvested energy.
Keywords
Architecture model of embedded system with limited power
resources, Energy Management, Microcontroller power saving
strategies, RF transmission power saving strategies.
1. INTRODUCTION
ignificant advances in microelectronics technology made the
increasing miniaturi!ation of embedded systems possible.
This trend to miniaturi!ation began in the late "#$%s and, as
stated by Moore&s 'aw that the power of microprocessors
doubles about every "( months, has held true with astonishing
accuracy and consistency until the beginning of the )"st
century. An announcement li*e that by +,M concerning the
use of )#.# nm technology to print circuits indicates that this
trend will continue for a number of chip generations.
The trend is leading to and will result in the development of
tiny embedded systems, integrated into more and more
everyday ob-ects. And will create a world of smart devices
surrounding us. For e.ample, parents will no longer lose trac*
of their children, even in the busiest crowds, when location
sensors and communication modules are sewn into their
clothes. imilar devices attached to timetables and signposts
could guide blind or foreign people in un*nown environments
by tal*ing to them.
Another interesting possibility offered by such technology
would be the creation of intelligent homes where a
refrigerator can detect old food, a washing machine can /uery
the instructions for dirty clothes, or window and door handles
indicate whether they are open or closed. This concept called
ambient intelligence, where humans have computing and
networ*ing technology embedded in their surroundings, was
developed by the +TA0 advisory group.
1hile this vision may sound utopian when you first hear
about it, current technology is already at stage where it is
possible to reali!e it. Ambient intelligence re/uires that there
be thousands of tiny embedded devices in the environment.
Each of these devices re/uire some source of power for it to
function. 1hile power can be sent to them through cables or
batteries, neither of these possibilities offers an effective and
long term solution. The large number of these devices ma*es
it highly desirable that they be fully self-sustaining and
service-free. This can be achieved by harvesting energy from
the environment.
Energy harvesting is a way of using the omnipresent sources
of energy in our surroundings, li*e from moving ob-ects,
vibrating machine parts, temperature changes, electromagnetic
waves such as light, radio or infrared. The idea is not new, but
successful and low-cost reali!ation in embedded systems calls
for the right e.pertise. A specific design approach is needed
for embedded systems fulfilling the concept of ambient
intelligence.
2. EMBEDDED SYSTEM DESIGN
IT! "IMITED #OER RESOURCES
Each system design has to begin with a specification.
Focusing on devices for an ambient intelligence application,
we will loo* at the design problems of embedded systems
e.pected to satisfy the following re/uirements2
elf-sustaining and service-free
Energy harvesting from the environment
eamless wireless communication interface
+nteraction with real time events
3nobtrusive hardware
The first step to ta*e when designing an embedded system is
to build its architecture. An architecture model of an
embedded system with limited power resources is shown in
Figure ". To understand the design problems of such systems,
you must first understand their functional concept.
The energy harvested from the environment 4 which can be a
single pulse or a continuous flow from a solar cell,
thermoelectric or electro dynamic energy converter 4 is
temporarily stored and then used to power a microcontroller
for a short period of about several milliseconds. 5uring this
time the controller receives data from associated sensors and
transmits the data wirelessly together with an identification
code. After transmission the circuit turns off completely and
can be started again when energy is available. 6r if there is a
"
International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 8887)
Volume 100 No.1 Au!ust "01#
continuous flow of energy 7for e.ample from a solar cell or
thermo energy converter8 the circuit enters a sleep mode with
low energy consumption.
There are three critical design constraints with such systems2
Energy management
9omputing resources
:rice aspect
All these parameters are tied together and for a successful
design they must be properly balanced. 9hanging one of them
could influence another. They are loo*ed at below and
possible solutions are pointed out.
Fig.".Architecture model of embedded system with limited
power resource&s.
2.1 ENERGY MANAGEMENT
6nce the re/uirements and architecture of the power limited
system are defined, the ne.t important part of the design
process is to determine how much energy is available. This
can be done through an energy budget analysis that
determines energy availability and consumption during the
period of time. +t is essential to validate energy budget
calculations with simulations, although building up a
simulation model of the system is not a trivial tas*. There are
several software tools available on the mar*et that can help
here, for e.ample Matlab imulin* or :-pice. All following
system design steps must be based on the energy budget
calculations.Energy converters deliver a certain amount of
energy in the form of voltage and current that is stored in
capacitors. From the time delivery aspect you can characteri!e
energy converters as follows2
9onverters delivering energy periodically
9onverters delivering short energy bursts
The first group of converters can power a system seamlessly
and continuously by storing the energy when available for a
longer time. +n such a scenario the time for completing the
tas*s does not play a critical role. E.amples of converters
belonging to this group are solar panels, thermo converter
based on a :eltier element, windmills and dynamos. The
concept of efficient energy management in such systems is to
switch on the circuit for as short a time and as infre/uently as
the application allows, and for the rest of the time the circuit
should idle with very low power consumption.
1ith the second group of energy converters the time aspect is
critical. An e.ample of such a converter is a pie!o or an
electro dynamical element. The greatest energy savings in
such systems can be achieved by starting a system and
completing the re/uired processing tas*s within the shortest
possible time. An important re/uirement for a successful
design is to minimi!e the power consumption factors.
,ased on the embedded system architecture shown in Fig.",
the following are domains where you can apply power saving
strategies. +t is important to understand that most of the
optimi!ation factors spo*en of here can interact, and wrong
combination can cancel the energy saving benefit.
2.2 MICROCONTRO""ER #OER
SA$ING STRATEGIES
S%&&ly 'ol(a)e
+n the case of a microcontroller, power consumption is
proportional to the s/uare of the supply voltage. o the lower
the supply voltage of the microcontroller, the better are the
power perspectives. There are three types of power
consumption relevant to microcontrollers and digital circuits2
+nternal power, switching power and lea*age. +nternal power
and switching power are referred to as dynamic power and
lea*age as static power ;"(<. 1hen choosing the
microcontroller for a system it is important to consider these
values.
S(ar(%& (*me
The startup time of a microcontroller also plays also a very
important role. +t is usually influenced by oscillator delay.
Mechanical resonant devices such as crystals and ceramic
resonators can ta*e several milliseconds to stabili!e. R9
oscillators, by contrast, provide fast startup but generally
suffer from poor accuracy over temperature and supply
voltage. To save time it is advisable to use a microcontroller
that can start with an R9 oscillator and subse/uently switch to
a crystal oscillator.
)
International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 8887)
Volume 100 No.1 Au!ust "01#
2.1 #OER +EATURES
Microcontrollers offer several power saving features li*e
ad-ustable cloc* fre/uency, voltage scaling, different sleep
modes. Many embedded processors now include features such
as run-time power modes that are used to scale power
consumption2
tatic power management2 this approach does not
depend on 9:3 activity. An e.ample of this style is
user-activated power-down modes.
5ynamic power management2 this approach is
based on 9:3 activity. An e.ample of this approach
is disabling functional units.
+t is important to consider how much energy saving can be
achieved by which features in the designed system.
2.,. SO+TARE #OER SA$ING
STRATEGIES
6ne of the ways to reduce system power consumption by
software is with energy-efficient source code transformation.
There are several high-level software optimi!ation techni/ues
of performance such as loop unrolling, procedure in-lining.
,etter software performance reduces e.ecution time, therefore
energy is saved.
Another way of saving energy is to use operating systems that
support energy-constrained RT scheduling or dynamic power
management 75:M8. 5:M strategies are strategies that
attempt to ma*e power-mode-related decisions based on
information available at runtime.
,esides sophisticated software methods, much energy can be
saved by stic*ing to few simple rules2
More 9:3 activity means more power.
The software should put the microcontroller to sleep
when waiting for an event.
6ne thing to consider when wa*ing a 9:3 is the
oscillator startup time.
There are also power down costs. :ower down costs
include factors such as the time to enter and e.it the
mode and the energy consumed by doing this.
Avoiding flash, EE:R6M and other memory writes.
implicity of software means efficiency, resulting in
energy saving.
2.- R+ TRANSMISSION #OER SA$ING
STRATEGIES
Most energy in an embedded system defined by the
architecture shown in Fig." is consumed by radio
communication. +t is caused by the power consumption of
each RF bloc* li*e '=A, down converter, synthesi!er, etc.
This leads to the conclusion that power limited embedded
systems should use RF transmitters with a minimal number of
active components. Another important fact of minimi!ing
power drained by the RF bloc* is to minimi!e the time the
transmitter is turned on. aving energy during RF
transmission is also possible by using an energy optimi!ed
transmission protocol with small data overhead and strategies
such as not transmitting empty data 7e.g. leading !eros8. An
important consideration during energy optimi!ed RF design is
the transmission rate and modulation type.
Com&%(*n) reso%r.es
Embedded systems with limited power resources have limited
functionality time given by the circumstance that all tas*s
must be e.ecuted during the time period while energy is
available. Therefore the correctness of the computations
depends not only on the logical correctness of a computation
but also on the time in which the result is produced. ,ased on
this fact all embedded systems with limited power resources
are considered to be real time. To ensure that all re/uired tas*s
are completed in time, there must be enough computing
resources available. This re/uirement could be fulfilled by
using a powerful microcontroller.
6n the other hand the more powerful and comple. the
microcontroller, the more energy is re/uired for its
functionality. 1hat ma*es the design of the system even more
difficult is that the time period during which enough
operational energy is available varies. This is caused by the
fact that the amount of energy delivered by the energy
converter is not constant. +t is important to calculate with the
worst case time period when the least energy is available in
the system. To determine what computing resources are
needed for correct functionality of the system, it must be
classified from the perspective of the application. According
to the timeline aspect you can classify real time embedded
systems in the following way2
>ard2 a late response is incorrect and implies a
system failure. An e.ample of such a system is
medical e/uipment monitoring vital functions of a
human body, where a late response would be
considered a failure.
oft2 timelines re/uirements are defined by using an
average response time. +f a single computation is
late, it is not usually significant, although repeated
late computation can result in system failures.
1ea*ly hard2 this is a combination of both hard and
soft timelines re/uirements. A wea*ly hard system
is one in which few late responses will not lead to a
total failure, but missing more than a few may lead
to complete and catastrophic failure.
For e.ample, if a smo*e detector after detecting smo*e starts
the alarm few seconds later or earlier it is not functionally
critical. ,ut delaying the alarm by several minutes can lead to
serious damage.
The second classification criteria is to determine whether the
system is fail-safe or fail operational.
For e.ample, if a temperature sensor powered by a thermo
converter s*ips several measurement data caused by lac* of
energy, it is not critical. +n the case of the smo*e detector
powered by a solar cell, such a situation is not allowed to
happen.
Another important design step is to list and analy!e each tas*
that the system must perform during its function. The typical
tas*s of the system based on the architecture shown in Fig."
are2
elf-test 7memory, program chec*8
:ower management 7sleep mode?wa*e-up timing,
available energy measurements8
5ata processing 7data ac/uisition from sensors and
evaluation, radio protocol preparation, 9R9
calculation, encryption8
5ata transmission 7transmission timing, listen
before tal*, repetitive transmission, fre/uency
hopping to assure failure safe transmission8.
/. CONC"USION
@
International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 8887)
Volume 100 No.1 Au!ust "01#
There are a large number of design re/uirements with power
limited embedded systems, ma*ing the design process a
complicated procedure. The most efficient way to handle all
the design problems is to develop an integrated system on
chip solution in the form of an A+9. At present there is an
ongoing.
A+9 development that should offer an effective cost
optimi!ed solution to most of the design problems mentioned
in this paper.
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