Is There Light at the Ends of the Tunnel? Wireless Sensor Networks for Adaptive Lighting in Road Tunnels

Existing deployments of wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are often conceived as stand-alone monitoring tools. In this paper, we report instead on a deployment where the WSN is a key component of a closed-loop control system for adaptive lighting in operational road tunnels. WSN nodes along the tunnel walls report light readings to a control station, which closes the loop by setting the intensity of lamps to match a legislated curve. The ability to match dynamically the lighting levels to the actual environmental conditions improves the tunnel safety and reduces its power consumption. The use of WSNs in a closed-loop system, combined with the real-world, harsh setting of operational road tunnels, induces tighter requirements on the quality and timeliness of sensed data, as well as on the reliability and lifetime of the network. In this work, we test to what extent mainstream WSN technology meets these challenges, using a dedicated design that however relies on wellestablished techniques. The paper describes the hw/sw architecture we devised by focusing on the WSN component, and analyzes its performance through experiments in a real, operational tunnel

Adaptive Lighting in Road Tunnels Using Wireless Sensor Networks

Tunnels are an integral component of the road infrastructure in almost all European countries. Their operation is a concern for most local authorities, as it affects the drivers’ safety, and it involves significant energy expenditures due to lighting and ventilation. To address these issues, the Province of Trento, Italy (PAT) is funding a 3-year research and development project1 called TRITon (Trentino Research and Innovation for Tunnel Monitoring, triton.disi.unitn.it), involving the local university and research centers, as well as industry partners