Tagging cities? Reading RFID tags from inside brick and mortar

RFID has been traditionally used for tagging moving objects. In this poster, we explore using it to tag and annotate fixed struc- tures like buildings and even city infrastructures. Based on the as- sumption that in order to avoid tampering and vandalism, the RFID tags could be implanted in building materials, we perform the read- ing performance measurement with RFID tags buried in concrete bricks. We find that the reading distance is decimated to a few cen- timeters, both in the completely buried case and the exposed case. The implication is that the intended application is immediately pos- sible for mobile robots that can place the RFID reader a few cen- timeters above the floor while navigating. But for human users, the reading distance should be much longer. In future, we will inves- tigate how we can extend the reading range of the passive RFID tags even when they are attached to or embedded in the building materials.