Innovative Technologies

Diagram showing ocean flow across the bi-directional tidal turbine

Modelling and simulation have progressed to become the third pillar of science¹  and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is one such application that is used to develop renewable energy products.

The ocean has the highest energy density of renewable energy sources, compared to others like wind, solar, biomass and geothermal. Existing ocean energy technologies are limited, costly and time consuming.

A*STAR’s Institute of High Performance Computing (IHPC), in collaboration with Bluenergy Solutions Pte Ltd, designed a tidal turbine using CFD simulations to convert tidal energy into electricity using the difference in the vertical height between the incoming high tides and the outgoing low tides.

¹ Source: Mathematics and Computation: The Third Pillar of Science

Overview of the High Performance Precision Agriculture (HiPPA) project

The shortage of skilled agricultural workers in Singapore¹ makes it difficult to scale the indoor vertical farming industry to profitable and sustainable levels.

To alleviate such manpower challenges, indoor farms are exploring the use of robotics to automate operations, which increases precision and consistency in production while reducing contamination risks from human workers. This supports Singapore’s 30-by-30 target, which aims to meet 30% of our nutritional needs through locally produced food by 2030².

A*STAR, in collaboration with Temasek Life Sciences Laboratory (TLL) and National University of Singapore (NUS), has embarked on the development of a High Performance Precision Agriculture (HiPPA) project, which offers a comprehensive solution for maximum value-to-cost ratio for high-tech indoor farming. It integrates robotics, non-invasive sensors and artificial intelligence to optimise environmental parameters and molecular breeding, creating a comprehensive plants-to-agronomics screening platform to maximise crop production.

As part of the HiPPA project, A*STAR’s Institute for Infocomm Research (I²R) designed and developed:

1. Mobile phytochemical profiling robot

   The robot is equipped with an autonomous navigation system which incorporates I²R’s vision-based place recognition technique and collision avoidance algorithms, and a spectrometer system from A*STAR’s Institute of Bioengineering and Bioimaging (IBB). This enables the robot to navigate the farm autonomously and reach into the racks to position sensors near vegetables for consistent, timely and precise phytochemical profiling.

   
   Mobile manipulator robot for phytochemical profiling of leafy greens

2. AI-optimised end effector for dexterous manipulation of vegetables

   Due to the fragile nature of leafy vegetables and compact environment of the indoor farming shelves, specialised robotic manipulation techniques are required for robots to plant or harvest vegetables with minimal damage. I²R has designed an end effector solution, mounted at the end of the robot arm, to handle the vegetables gently. It uses machine learning techniques to recognise browning and other damage from RGB and potentially hyperspectral images to assess damages in the handled vegetables.

¹ Source: Businesstimes.com.sg - Singapore's agri-tech sector will add 4700 jobs by 2030 
² Source: Greenplan.gov.sg - Key focus areas

The Fonda and Innovation Factory @ SIMTech teams behind the lamp post EV charger protype

Using a lamp post to charge an electric vehicle? It is now possible! The Innovation Factory @ SIMTech and Fonda Global Engineering (Fonda) have co-created an electric vehicle (EV) charging technology that can be integrated into the existing street lighting infrastructure – a first-of-its kind in Singapore.

With the push for greater EV adoption in Singapore, there is a need for more accessible EV charging stations which are currently limited to selected petrol stations, shopping malls and private estates. The lamp post mounted EV charger prototype developed by Fonda and the Innovation Factory @ SIMTech combines Fonda’s industry knowledge in integrating EV chargers to existing lamp post circuit systems in Singapore, with domain expertise from the Innovation Factory @ SIMTech in electrification standards for the EV chargers to be implemented in outdoor environmental conditions. Beside lamp posts, this scalable EV charging system can also be mounted on bollards or walls, which encourages quicker implementation of EV charging infrastructure to meet the increased demand for EV charging solutions in Singapore.

Overview of virtual power plant (VPP) with aggregation of distributed energy resources (DERs)

As Singapore journeys towards achieving its sustainable energy goals, there is a pressing need to increase the efficiency of power distribution. This can be done through the intelligent integration of virtual power plants (VPPs) with existing physical power plants. Such VPPs comprise of distributed energy resources (DERs) – small-scale power generation resources that are interconnected on the electric grid which can be used individually or aggregated, allowing energy supply to be optimised based on demand.

Traditional communication networks, which manage the energy supply between the physical power plants and DERs, use costly fibre pilot cables which are cumbersome to install and maintain. In contrast, wireless communication networks are convenient and cost-effective without any need for physical cables. However, they are usually unable to meet the VPP’s quality of service (QoS) requirement due to security and stability issues.

To enable VPPs to consistently achieve the QoS requirement, A*STAR’s Institute for Infocomm Research (I²R), Energy Research Institute at Nanyang Technological University (ERI@N), Sembcorp Industries and Nokia are collaborating to design, develop, testbed and optimise future-ready network solutions.

Benefits

• Offers 2-way highly reliable and resilient wireless communication for VPPs:
  Able to remotely control the DERs and collect information for remote monitoring, predictive analytics and optimisation. The developed wireless communication comes with enhancement features to push the limit of current wireless network and support the VPP-required extreme QoS. Such techniques can be expanded to support implementation in 4G as well as 5G and beyond networks
• Provides a useful reference (especially for relevant regulatory and standardisation bodies) for development of future wireless communication specifications, including network setup, connectivity and interaction between VPP and other sub-systems in Energy Grid 2.0:
  As current codes of practice for energy grid are mainly based on wired networks, the solution provides a full picture of existing network performance (i.e. public 4G and 5G), identifies its limitations and recommends techniques to improve the performance accordingly
• Potentially support future applications with similar or more stringent QoS, paving the way for the development of more novel smart grid applications beyond VPPs

How will silicon carbide (SiC) power the future of electric vehicles (EVs)?

While silicon-based devices are predominantly used in today’s power electronics, next-generation power electronics are expected to be based on Wide-Bandgap materials like silicon carbide (SiC). With higher energy efficiencies and smaller form factors, SiC power devices can yield energy savings in several key systems inside electric vehicles (EVs) including the traction inverter which is the ‘engine’ of an EV, on-board chargers and DC-DC converters that are used to power headlights, interior lights, wiper, window motors, fans, pumps and more.

SiC solutions can outperform conventional silicon (Si) devices in power electronics for electric vehicles (EVs) and industrial applications to meet the need for power modules with smaller form factors or higher power outputs, as well as higher temperature operation.

A*STAR’s Institute of Microelectronics (IME) is teaming up with STMicroelectronics, a global semiconductor leader serving customers across the spectrum of electronics applications, to develop and optimise silicon carbide (SiC) integrated devices and package modules. The aim is to offer significantly better performance in next-generation power electronics applications in the automotive and industrial markets. The partnership sets a foundation for a comprehensive SiC ecosystem in Singapore and creates opportunities for other companies to engage with IME and STMicroelectronics in SiC research.

How can we prolong a sensor’s lifespan and make it more energy efficient?

The move towards Industrial 4.0 has led to extensive research on Internet-of-Things (IoT) sensor nodes. These are devices that can sense, compute, store, transmit and receive data. Current sensor nodes, which uses always-on sensors can only last around a year on average.

To address this efficiency issue, A*STAR’s Institute of Microelectronics (IME) and the National University of Singapore (NUS) have been researching towards increasing the battery lifespan of IoT sensors, with the solution being microelectromechanical system (MEMS) acceleration switches, which utilises environmental vibration, sound, temperature, or pressure to activate the sensor nodes when it is on standby phase, as opposed to current standards which uses electricity.

This sustainable technology can last up till 10 times of today’s standard, or up to 10 years. This reduces battery waste and battery replacement rate, an important feature as more sensor nodes are being rolled out to advance digital twins of manufacturing plants and urban settings for monitoring and planning.

Dr Ye Shaochun from NMC, A*STAR (Left) and Henry Yeo from ACEZ Sensing Pte Ltd (Right) with the self-calibrating temperature sensor demonstrated in a sensor testing system

Temperature sensors generally decline over time, with the sensor drift resulting in inaccurate measurements. Approximately 5 per cent of energy is wasted with every 0.1°C of error in temperature sensing. Thus, it is recommended for sensors to undergo annual calibration to ensure accuracy. However, the conventional lab calibration of sensors is a costly and tedious process, and the risk of sensor drift being undetected still remains even with regular calibration.

To address these issues, A*STAR’s National Metrology Centre (NMC) has developed a self-calibrating temperature sensor prototype which can monitor the energy efficiency of chiller plants. Through its automatic self-calibrating capabilities, the innovative sensor offers the user up to 80 per cent in cost savings by eliminating the need to send the sensor for annual lab calibration.

The sensor prototype can perform inline self-calibration at 16°C using the integrated physical reference, where any deviation from this temperature will be verified and corrected automatically.

The prototype sensor with the supporting software was successfully demonstrated in a chiller plant sensor testing system at NMC in March 2022. The technology has been licensed to ACEZ Sensing Pte Ltd, a Singapore-based temperature sensor manufacturer, for the production of self-calibrating temperature sensors.

Overview of the Self-Diagnosis and Self-Healing (SDSH) technology

How do we maintain the accuracy and reliability of sensing data in Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) while reducing laborious and costly lab-based calibration at the same time?

The increased need for productivity and efficiency have prompted the increase in digitalisation within manufacturing lines. Many sensors are installed at the shopfloors to monitor important elements such as production processes, machine health, product quality and more. Accuracy and reliability of the sensing data is increasingly becoming critical in ensuring reliable factory control and planning as we move towards a smarter and more sustainable coupling of IIoT within the manufacturing line.

A*STAR’s National Metrology Centre (NMC) has developed an online, data-driven calibration method, to enable autonomous quality assurance of sensing data. The Self-Diagnosis and Self-Healing (SDSH) algorithm monitors sensor health continuously, reducing the need for lab-based calibration and wastage from sensing errors, thus minimising resources needed to maintain the sensors' performance.

Media dosage units are commonly used in shot peening and blasting processes to impart the necessary surface treatment and improve the strength and lifetime of metallic components used in the aerospace, automotive, energy and marine industries. Media dosage units currently available in the market have difficulty in meeting the demand for high flowrate applications required in shot peening and blasting applications. These dosage units often have technical limitations associated with contact measurements when used with different types of abrasive media.

A*STAR’s Advanced Remanufacturing and Technology Centre (ARTC), National Metrology Centre (NMC), and local SME enterprise Abrasive Engineering (AE) have successfully designed and patented a working prototype for high flowrate ferrous media dosage units, capable of achieving high flowrates of up to 1,500kg/min with the lowest power consumption, while ensuring high accuracy and stability. The developed working prototype accurately regulates the amount of media flowing through to the shot peening machines, so that the amount of media hitting the component surface will be consistent, ensuring quality of the peened parts.

The design of this high flowrate prototype can potentially bring AE’s business competitiveness to the next level as the company is now able to support requirements of higher flow rates to meet the demands of the market.

High purity CO₂ sensor for industry applications

Commonly known as a greenhouse gas, CO₂ has wide applications in industries such as F&B, medical and research, with each industry requiring different levels of CO₂ purity. Additionally, CO₂ contamination (e.g rusty pipes, oil vapours, etc) can occur due to improper storage, rendering the CO₂ feedstock unusable. With new innovations being developed to utilise CO2₂ at an industrial scale, it is increasingly crucial to know the quality of the CO₂ before it can be used across various applications.

A*STAR’s Institute of Microelectronics (IME) and local SME Agile Biz Tech have collaborated to develop a CO₂ Purity Measuring and Monitoring Module (CPMM), which can measure CO₂ purity in real-time (ranging from 98% to 100% CO₂ purity) with strong accuracy (±0.2%).

The sensor’s readings can be conveyed to a central database for monitoring and analysis, so that users can respond promptly to maintenance needs when the readings display anomalies. The research team is looking for commercial partners on the CO₂ sensor to extend the solution to more industry applications.

Have you ever wondered how to reduce wastage in 3D printing?

Selective laser melting (SLM) is widely used today as an additive manufacturing (AM) process. During this process, several print parameters (e.g. laser power, scanning speed, powder layer thickness, etc) affect the external dimensional accuracy of the final printed part, however, there is a lack of universal standards to optimise the print parameters.

A*STAR's National Metrology Centre (NMC) has developed accurate and reliable measurement methodologies and standard samples. The designed standard samples can be fabricated by SLM and checked by our measurement methodologies. This allows accurate measurement of data to optimise AM printing parameters, ensuring that the printed parts have better quality while reducing wastage with less failed printed parts.