Implementation of LoRa and Bluetooth technology in farming application with performance analysis

Abstract

In the Farming field, IoT plays an important role by collecting datasets from remotely placed farm fields through a communication protocol, where the things are connected in closed-loop network form which is called precision farming. The Internet of Things (IoT) has created ample opportunity for researchers to exchange information for wide range and short range communication such as Wi-Fi (Wireless Fidelity), Bluetooth, ZigBee, LoRa (Long Range), 6LoWPAN, LoRaWAN (Long Range Wide Area Network), NB-IoT (Narrow Band IoT) etc, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) addresses low-power short-range connectivity, while LoRa addresses low-power long-range connectivity. Both technologies employ unlicensed, spread spectrum technology. Bluetooth can send data continuously over a short distance, usually less than 10 meters. LoRa has an urban range of connectivity between 2-5 kilometers, while in a rural setting, it can reach up to 15 kilometers. So here we aim to design and develop LoRa and Bluetooth-enabled IoT applications to collect the datasets from the farm fields such as Temperature, Relative Humidity, Rain percentage, and soil moisture.