title: Wireless in-situ Sensor Network for Agriculture and Water Monitoring on a River Basin Scale in Southern Finland: Evaluation from a Data User's Perspective.
abstract: Sensor networks are increasingly being implemented for environmental monitoring and agriculture to provide spatially accurate and continuous environmental information and (near) real-time applications. These networks provide a large amount of data which poses challenges for ensuring data quality and extracting relevant information. In the present paper we describe a river basin scale wireless sensor network for agriculture and water monitoring. The network, called SoilWeather, is unique and the first of this type in Finland. The performance of the network is assessed from the user and maintainer perspectives, concentrating on data quality, network maintenance and applications. The results showed that the SoilWeather network has been functioning in a relatively reliable way, but also that the maintenance and data quality assurance by automatic algorithms and calibration samples requires a lot of effort, especially in continuous water monitoring over large areas. We see great benefits on sensor networks enabling continuous, real-time monitoring, while data quality control and maintenance efforts highlight the need for tight collaboration between sensor and sensor network owners to decrease costs and increase the quality of the sensor data in large scale applications.
authors.affiliation: Finnish Environment Institute, Jyväskylä Office / PO Box 35, FIN-40014 University of Jyväskylä / Finland; E-Mail:  timo.huttula@environment.fi.
authors.forename: Niina
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Kotamäki
authors.forename: Sirpa
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Thessler
authors.forename: Jari
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Koskiaho
authors.forename: Asko O
authors.initials: AO
authors.lastname: Hannukkala
authors.forename: Hanna
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Huitu
authors.forename: Timo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Huttula
authors.forename: Jukka
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Havento
authors.forename: Markku
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Järvenpää