Passive RFIDs can now stream telemetry data from sensors

To advance the ‘ambient internet of things’ – no batteries required

A quartet of Japanese organisations plan to build “advanced ambient internet of things systems” using a newly approved ISO standard.

The standard is ISO/IEC 18000-65, aka “Parameters for air interface communications for streaming sensors based on ISO/IEC 18000-63.”

The background to the standard is that passive tags like RFIDs contain very limited information and don’t have a power source. Light ‘em up with radio waves and the small amount of energy produced sees the tags transmit that information – essentially their name, rank, and serial number. That makes RFIDs handy in warehouses where they’re used to identify items without requiring visual inspection or line-of-sight devices like a barcode scanner.

Active RFIDs exist and can serve as sensors – but need a battery or other power source, and that’s not always possible or convenient.

Clever folks have also found a way to mate sensors with passive RFIDs.

As explained by Panasonic, “RFID systems and wireless power transfer in the 920 MHz band have been used to implement battery-free wireless sensor systems, but it has not been possible to continuously and simultaneously acquire time-series data such as vibration, strain, or temperature.”

The new standard makes it possible to stream data from sensors married to passive tags, by allocating a frequency channel to each device. When radio waves reaches a tag, the device wakes up and broadcasts the basic info it contains and then negotiates a clear channel on which to stream data.

Panasonic says the standard means devices and sensor terminals from different manufacturers can interoperate, potentially “facilitating development of diverse battery-free wireless sensor systems, avoiding vendor lock-in and reducing system procurement costs.”

The Japanese company, along with compatriots at Keio University, Denso Wave Incorporated, and Ramxeed Ltd, proposed ISO/IEC 18000-65. Keio University also hosts an Ambient IoT communication research consortium, which focuses on wireless power and backscatter communication.

Participants hope to create unpowered networks of sensors and tags, to gather operational information about machinery and infrastructure without the need for human intervention. The consortium also sees a role for this tech to gather data to feed into machine learning systems that power predictive maintenance systems, which it hopes will reduce the impact of Japan’s declining and ageing population. ®