Abstract: To design an energy efficient routing algorithm is a hot topic in the research of wireless sensor networks. Energy (battery) of the sensor node is considered as the scarcest resource in Wireless Sensor Network (WSN), hence a communication protocol that efficiently uses the limited energy must be developed. Cluster Heads (CHs) form the backbone of the crucial inter-cluster communication for Wireless Sensor Network (WSN). Due to relaying high data traffic, some of these nodes quickly exhaust their precious energy and increase the risk of node failure. In conjunction with the node failure, data packet loss also occurs in a CH due to congestion and poor link quality. For the problem present of energy efficient inter-cluster routing for WSN, this study is giving a three phased solution. In the first phase derived link quality and congestion metrics using bit error rate and packet loss rate due to congestion respectively. The bit rate and error rate detection is followed by to select cluster heads, cooperative particles of swarm were initialized in PSO. In the final stage of the proposed method fitness function is calculated based on the three metrics namely energy cost, bit error rate and packet loss rate due to congestion so as to determine the optimal path.. The proposed protocol of REC is effective in prolonging the network lifetime, as well as supporting for scalable network. This study’s technique achieves substantial energy savings and improved reliability over the contemporary cluster based routing techniques. The effectiveness of the routing algorithm presented in this study considerably increasing the efficiency of routing.