Project start: 1.10.2025.

Climate change, with rising temperatures and sea levels, extreme weather events, and the increased frequency of wildfires and floods, has a huge impact on the environment, human health, natural resources, and food security. The objective of the EMAS project is developing an innovative approach to address these challenges through the creation of miniaturized intelligent sensor nodes for remote environmental monitoring. The nodes will be based on energy harvesting (EH) devices with enhanced performances. Advancements in clean EH technologies, in combination with digital communication protocols, foster the synergistic use of green and digital transitions tools. In fact, a distributed network of EH-powered autonomous sensor stations, which transmit data to digital repositories in optimized duty cycles, enables continuous monitoring of environmental parameters. This approach enhances the understanding of environmental conditions while reducing installation and maintenance costs. EH solutions also offer a sustainable alternative to conventional energy sources by eliminating the need for frequent battery replacements, thus reducing waste and environmental impact. The reduced human presence in protected or remote areas further contributes to ecosystem conservation. By leveraging the expertise in EH technologies of University of Rijeka researchers, in collaboration with peers from the University of Padua, the project will develop optimized configurations of EH converters focused on kinetic EH. The optimization of converters' design will aim at maximizing their power outputs in the considered environments, with particular emphasis on piezoelectric and composite systems. The project’s activities will result in high-quality publications in prestigious scientific journals and conference presentations, fostering scientific collaboration and innovation in the field of intelligent EH systems. The project will also contribute to capacity building of the involved young researchers.