A hierarchical wireless sensor network design for monitoring a pipeline infrastructure

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) represent a new area of research which is rapidly growing due to development of new inexpensive sensor technology. Such electronic devices have increased capability in processing data, storing in memory, communication, and networking to communicate with other devices. Such WSNs can be used in a vast number of applications including environmental monitoring, military, ecology, agriculture, inventory control, robotics, and health care. This chapter first discusses the issues and challenges involved in using this new and very promising technology in the protection and monitoring of the critical and essential infrastructures of pipelines carrying oil, gas, water, and other important resources. Then, it presents a routing protocol for WSNs along with an architectural model and new hierarchical addressing scheme for such a network. The framework and associated protocols are optimized by exploring the linear nature of the network so as to decrease installation and maintenance costs, minimize energy requirements, increase the reliability, and improve the communication efficiency. Simulation experiments using the proposed model, addressing scheme, and routing protocol have been conducted to test and evaluate the network performance under various network conditions. Finally, the chapter presents several open issues and challenges that can be pursued for important additional research and investigation.