Emerging LPWAN Technologies for Smart Environments: An Outlook

Low-power wide-area network (LPWAN) technologies are emerging communication systems that aim to present a new concept supporting wide area communication with low power requirements for smart environments such as smart grids (SGs), smart cities, smart meters (SMs) and Internet of Things (IoT). This study presents a systematical analysis for popular LPWAN technologies such as Ultra Narrowband (UNB), Long Range (LoRa), Long Term Evolution for Machines (LTE-M) and Narrow Band IoT (NB-IoT). Technical structures, advantages and drawbacks of these communication technologies are detailed examined by considering their operating spectrum, where UNB and LoRa technologies operate on unlicensed spectrum while LTE-M and NB-IoT technologies work on licensed spectrum. Consequently, it is shown that it is not yet clear which one of these technologies will be winner since there currently exist several challenges to be solved such as battery life, capacity and cost.