Abstract
Routing protocols play a pivotal role in the energy management and lifespan of any Wireless Sensor Network. Lower network lifetime has been one of the biggest concerns in LEACH protocol due to dead nodes. The LEACH protocol suffers from uneven energy distribution problem due to random selection of a cluster head. The cluster head has much greater responsibility compared to other non- cluster head nodes and consumes greater energy for its roles. This results in early dead nodes due to energy lost for the role of cluster- head. This study proposes an approach to balance the energy consumption of the LEACH protocol by using a semi-deterministic opportunity coefficient to select the cluster head. This is calculated in each node with the battery energy level and node ID. Ultimately, based on the opportunity cost, cluster head will be selected and broadcasted for which other nodes with higher opportunity cost will agree. It minimizes the chances of nodes with lower battery level being elected as cluster head. Our simulation experiments demonstrate that cluster heads chosen using our proposed algorithm perform better than those using the legacy LEACH protocol.