Reliable routing in wireless sensor networks for smart grid environments

The environmental conditions, e.g., fading, multi-path, obstructions, in smart grid environment, prevent reliable and successful packet transmissions for Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) technology. To provide reliable communications with WSN, to overcome the harsh environmental conditions of smart grid, and to prolong the network life time, reliable link quality estimation should be made and routing algorithms which consider multiple conditions, e.g., energy consumption, shortest path and link quality, should be used. In this paper, the performances of routing algorithms which can address this need are compared in terms of average delay, network lifetime and packet delivery rate in smart grid substation environment. Moreover, WSN-based smart grid applications and the challenges in estimation of link quality are briefly explained.