DESIGN OF WATER QUALITY MONITORING SYSTEM USING ZIGBEE WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS

Abstract

Water plays critical role in our daily activities and overall wellbeing of mankind. However, water contamination is a serious health concern, especially in developing regions, where inadequate access to portable water contributes to 80% of diseases that claims 1.8million lives yearly, most are children under the age of five. The traditional methods of monitoring water quality prove to be unreliable. In order to address shortcomings in the traditional methods of monitoring water quality, this study proposes a ZigBee-based wireless sensor network (WSN) that will monitor water quality in real time. The system is designed with sensor nodes that are built with pH, total dissolved solids (TDS) and temperature sensors to collect and transmit data to a monitoring station. Areas with limited access to internet and GSM services are considered, the network employs ZigBee technology to reliably transmit data while consuming less power. Results obtained while experimenting with the system demonstrate effectiveness, giving 95 to 100% success rate in data transmission, high sensor accuracy (pH error: 0.12%, TDS error: 1.28%, temperature error: 0%). Real-time visualization of water quality parameters is demonstrated by the system’s designed graphical user interface (GUI) enabling detection of violation of threshold values. Reliability of ZigBee-based WSN in continuous water quality monitoring is highlighted in the study, future work could focus on further reducing packet loss, expand range of monitored parameters, and using advance data analysis tools for predictive insight.