Energy-Aware Cooperative Localization Approach for Wireless Sensor Networks

Despite the fact that cooperative localization approaches stand well in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), they impose challenge of increased energy consumption resulting from the important communication overhead required to accomplish the localization task. In this paper, we developed an Energy Aware Cooperative Localization approach (EACL) based on using a recursive localization system. Obviously, system coverage increases iteratively as nodes with newly-estimated position join the reference set. Our approach implements a novel selection strategy of reference nodes that is beneficial in the sense that: (1) it reduces the adverse effects of error propagation and accumulation, and (2) helps conserve the residual energy of the sensor nodes. Furthermore, we introduced a refinement mechanism to further improve localization accuracy without incurring any additional costs. Simulations showed that our approach consistently reduces the position error. It allows also conserving the energy and consequently prolonging the WSN life time.