LoRaWAN is a communication protocol that takes advantage of the LoRa modulation, a wireless data transmission technology with lower bandwidths, to transmit small data packets (like sensor data) over long distances. With these features, LoRaWAN is great for use in industrial deployments.
The benefits of LoRaWAN include long range (up to 5 kilometers in urban areas and up to 15 kilometers or more in rural areas), long battery lifespan (10+ years), deep indoor penetration, public and private deployment options, FUOTA (Firmware Updates Over The Air), geolocation, and end-to-end security with 128-bit cryptographic keys and algorithms to provide two layers of security.
Learn How to Scale With LoRaWAN Use Cases and IoT in Different Verticals
With its features, LoRaWAN is suitable for many commercial and industrial applications. Here are three LoRaWAN use cases:
Condition monitoring for ships
The globally harmonized 2.4GHz frequency enables companies to use their devices across all continents, pushing IoT limits even further in demanding environments. LoRa 2.4GHz has seen steady adoption since its introduction. This includes gateways by manufacturers such as Multitech, Mikrotik, and IMST, as well as device and module makers such as Miromico, mcf88, Embit, and Vicotee.
LoRaWAN is actively used to collect more accurate data from a ship’s assets, such as the condition of machinery and engines, leaks, environmental measures, asset location, etc. The data is used to perform preventive maintenance, reducing the risk of ship grounding or incidents, thus reducing costs.
Smart water metering in cities
LoRaWAN provides accurate real-time water usage data to enable more precise billing and reduce the risks of water leakage on physical sites. LoRa connectivity and LoRaWAN® ensure sustainable indoor and outdoor connectivity, enabling successful data transmission, private network security, and fast installation. LoRaWAN is a cost-effective technology for building smart city solutions, as it allows collecting data over large areas and across devices that have a battery life of over 10 years.
Coventry and Warwickshire have recently planned to deploy 150K smart meters. The smart meters will provide real-time water usage data which will be used to reduce the risk of water leakage and to assess water consumption. With smart meters, out-of-ordinary water consumption can be detected quickly and water companies can work with their customers to better understand their water usage.
Air quality monitoring in educational institutions
The global pandemic has compelled many schools to find solutions to prevent the virus from spreading among students and teachers. With its long-range and deep indoor penetration features, LoRaWAN can be used for air-quality monitoring in buildings and help ensure a safe environment for students. Schools can implement periodic ventilation processes powered by LoRaWAN to reduce the risk of infections and teachers can be notified when they need to start a new ventilation process for optimal results.
With LoRaWAN, it is possible to reduce infection risk in any seasonal period, improve the learning quality by reducing exhaling gas concentrations before, during, and after the lessons, and optimize ventilation processes.
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