Recently, industrial wireless sensor networks have attracted more attention, due to their large benefits in terms of faster installation, cost savings, and flexibility. Nevertheless, the acceptance of wireless sensor networks by the industrial community is not without its difficulties. In fact, several research efforts have been made in this field and a number of state-of-the-art reviews exist, presenting the current standards, the challenges, and the design principles. However, a comprehensive review on routing protocols appears to be missing. In this paper, we give a survey on routing protocols for industrial monitoring applications of the wireless sensor networks technology, and we present their limitations and weaknesses according to the industrial requirements.
