Direct heat energy harvesting from wind by a permanent magnet eddy currents heater with different magnet arrangements

In this paper, we study the input torque of a permanent magnet eddy current heater (PMECH) as the main important parameter to generate heat directly from wind energy. The PMECH contains a metallic stator, which acts as a conductor, and a rotor covered by permanent magnets to generate a magnetic field on the conductor. We studied nine configurations varying in magnet arrangements on the rotor to show their effects on the input torque of the heat generator under different angular velocities from 100 to 500 RPMs. It is shown that having enough space between permanent magnets perpendicular to the rotational direction can increase the induced magnetic flux on the conductor, and we see a growth in the input energy of PMECH. Moreover, having an energy efficiency of more than 95% at different rotational speeds, PMECH can be an alternative energy converter system when it needs to generate thermal energy directly from the wind. Eddy currents heat generator has been known as an efficient way to convert wind energy into heat directly. In this paper, the torque characteristic of a permanent magnet eddy currents heater is studied to increase heat generation from wind experimentally and numerically. It is shown that the effects of some important parameters such as pole number and gap size between magnets are dominant in changing input torque.