Performance measurements of IEEE 802.15.4g wireless networks

The IEEE 802.15.4g standard is a wireless technology that can potentially enhance the capabilities of the Internet of Things. Originally conceived for Wireless Smart Utility Networks, it can be used in a number of potential application domains, both in urban and rural environments, as it provides low-power and low-cost communication over long distances, thus enabling Low-Power Wide Area Networks. In this paper, we show the results of a set of experiments carried out in real environments to measure the communication range in outdoor deployments. In our experiments, we used Zolertia remote sensor nodes and considered different scenarios, namely rural, semi-rural, and urban environments. The results obtained show that in the urban context, due to the presence of buildings, trees and other obstacles that prevent the signal propagation, the communication range is under 200m, while in a rural (open) environment it is possible to achieve longer distances, in the order of 800m.