Water sensor network applications: Time to move beyond the technical?

Wehave observed a dramatic increase recently in the range and diversity of hydrological and water resources projects using low‐cost sensor networks to collect data across space‐time. By reviewing the latest sensing and wireless communication technologies and their applications, and our recent experience of implementing hydrological sensors in low and middle income countries (Mountain‐EVO, 2017), we argue here that the research frontier for sensor networks has to move beyond purely technical considerations. This is because the scope of available low‐cost modules (such as Arduino, Raspberry Pi, and Xbee) and inexpensive sensors now enables rapid development of robust sensor networks that are highly effective and easily assembled rather than having to be built from scratch.With awide variety of functions and features, thesemodules can support customisation of hydrologicalmonitoring networks for users that have widely different goals and aspirations. “Non‐technical challenges” concern how the implementation of sensing, information, and communication technologies can be transformed into applications that meet contemporary societal challenges, such as water resourcesmanagement (Aqeel‐Ur‐Rehman, Islam, & Shaikh, 2014), disaster resilience building (Mao et al., 2017), and sustainable development (Buytaert et al., 2014). It is increasingly evident that these societal challenges should play amore important role than technological considerations in evaluating successful applications of information and communication technologies (ICTs). Nonetheless, these non‐technical aspects continue to be largely overlooked by hydrologists and sensor network developers.