Abstract

The realization of WUSNs (Wireless Underground Sensor Networks) will lead to many emerging applications, such as intelligent agriculture, underground pipelines, oil reservoir monitoring, concealed border patrol, earthquake and landslide forecasting, underground mine disaster prevention and rescue etc. The hostile underground environments prevent the direct use of most, if not all, existing wireless communication and networking solutions, due to the extremely high path loss, small communication range, and high dynamics of electromagnetic (EM) waves when penetrating the soil, sand, rock, water, crude oil medium in the underground environment and in pipelines. The objective of the paper is to address these unique and important challenges for the realization of wireless sensor networks in Oil Pipeline Systems. Research also focuses on developing a general framework using wireless sensor networks to provide continuous monitoring. © 2015 Chamber of Electrical Engineers of Turkey.