Wide-Area Water Pipeline Monitoring Using LoRaWAN Sensor Nodes and Ethernet-Based IoT Gateway

Abstract

Municipal water utilities face significant challenges in monitoring geographically distributed water reservoirs and pipelines. This research aims to develop a wide-area water monitoring system utilizing a hybrid LoRaWAN and Ethernet architecture to overcome connectivity limitations. The methodology involves designing remote sensor nodes and a centralized IoT gateway using open-source microcontrollers. The sensor nodes read water parameters and transmit data wirelessly via LoRa modules. The central gateway integrates a LoRa receiver, an Ethernet Shield, and an LCD. It processes the incoming radio telemetry, displays real-time measurements locally on the LCD for on-site technicians, and simultaneously forwards the data to a web dashboard via the local area network. System evaluation demonstrated that the LoRa nodes successfully transmitted sensor data over long distances with minimal packet loss. Furthermore, the Ethernet Shield maintained a stable, continuous data stream to the remote web server, ensuring accurate online monitoring. In conclusion, the integrated hybrid system provides a highly reliable, scalable, and cost-effective hardware solution, successfully bridging the gap between remote pipeline sensing and centralized real-time web monitoring for municipal utilities.