From the Editor: Utilizing Energy Harvesting to Power IoT Devices

The Internet of Things (IoT) is growing rapidly and so also the need to power electronic devices that enable IoT. Concurrently, the emerging 5G network is further improving the performance of connected devices to further drive the growth of IoT in emerging applications. Billions of connected devices must be powered reliably. Collectively, the load on utility power will be huge. Although, batteries would have been the clear choice, battery life today is limited to about two years or less, and devices operate for >10 years. In other words, replacing batteries multiple times during the life span of an IoT device is not practical. Thanks to energy harvesting (EH) advances, connected IoT devices/ sensors are now harnessing the power of clean and renewable energy sources, such as solar, wind, thermal, RF and vibration to name a few, to create self-powered IoT devices.