I-Canopy: A resilient IoT platform for adaptive environmental monitoring at the edge

Environmental monitoring in the context of the Internet of Things (IoT) faces persistent challenges in rural and remote areas where energy resources are limited and connectivity is intermittent. When IoT devices lack appropriate fallback mechanisms, these constraints can disrupt data collection and transmission. This paper presents I-Canopy, a low-cost, energy-autonomous IoT platform based on the ESP32 microcontroller, designed to monitor key atmospheric and soil parameters. Implemented at the edge, the system integrates energy-aware operation, local data storage, and cloud synchronization services to maintain resilient performance under limited power and intermittent network conditions, and it supports remote firmware updates. Evaluation results show that the system effectively manages changes in available supply voltage by adapting its sensing frequency and operational modes, maintaining functionality across different energy-availability levels. Although a few measurement gaps were observed, these were rare and mainly occurred during episodes of extreme cold or after unexpected reboots. During connectivity disruptions, measurements were stored locally and successfully uploaded once connectivity was restored, indicating that monitoring continuity was preserved. Overall, these results demonstrate that I-Canopy maintains robust field performance under real-world operating conditions.