Response Time and Intrinsic Information Quality as Criteria for the Selection of Low-Cost Sensors for Use in Mobile Weather Stations

Abstract

Smart-city management systems use information about the environment, including the current values of weather factors. The specificity of the urban sites requires a high density of weather measurement points, which forces the use of low-cost sensors. A typical problem of devices using low-cost sensors is the lack of legalization of the sensors and the resulting inaccuracy and uncertainty of measurement, which one can attempt to solve by additional sensor calibration. In this paper, we propose a different approach to this problem, i.e., the two-stage selection of sensors, carried out on the basis of both the literature (pre-selection) and experiments (actual selection). We formulated the criteria of the sensor selection for the needs of the sources of weather information: the major one, which is the fast response time of a sensor in a cyber-physical subsystem and two minor ones, which are based on the intrinsic information quality dimensions related to measurement information. These criteria were tested by using a set of twelve weather sensors from different manufacturers. Results show that the two-stage sensor selection allows us to choose the least energy consuming (due to the major criterion) and the most accurate (due to the minor criteria) set of weather sensors, and is able to replace some methods of sensor selection reported in the literature. The proposed method is, however, more versatile and can be used to select any sensors with a response time comparable to electric ones, and for the application of low-cost sensors that are not related to weather stations.