Sizing up the Batteries: Modelling of Energy-Harvesting Sensor Nodes in a Delay Tolerant Network

For energy-harvesting sensor nodes, rechargeable batteries play a critical role in sensing and transmissions. By coupling two simple Markovian queue models in a delay-tolerant networking setting, we consider the problem of battery sizing for these sensor nodes to operate effectively: given the intended energy depletion and overflow probabilities, how to decide the minimal battery capacity that is required to ensure opportunistic data exchange despite the inherent intermittency of renewable energy generation.