Energy Efficient Approaches in Wireless Sensor Networks

Energy efficiency is always a critical issue in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). The networks support many applications in different fields often deploying in harsh conditions that may not be accessible by a human. Even the devices have very small sizes and consume not much energy but the network always has a limited lifetime. However, the ambient working condition can be exploited to be able to support back energy to the networks. This paper aims to show all the possible causes that could be exploited either to reduce energy consumption for the networks or to harvest energy from the surrounding working areas for such networks. Depending on specific working areas suitable energy sources can be exploited. Solar, FR or many other sources can be considered, such as wind, thermal, etc. In addition, this work also reviews common methods to manage energy consumption for the networks, data routing methods, working schedules, battery management, etc. All of the efforts is to prolong the network lifetime. Analysis and simulation results are provided to clarify the problems.