Today we see that a major part of energy consumption in mobile networks comes from the radio base station sites and that the consumption is stable. We can also see that even in densely deployed networks, as i.
This restricts the potential use of the power models, as their validity and accuracy remain unclear. Future work includes the further development of the power consumption models to form a unified evaluation framework that enables the quantification and optimization of energy consumption and energy efficiency of 5G networks.
How much power does a 5G station use?
The power consumption of a single 5G station is 2.5 to 3.5 times higher than that of a single 4G station. The main factor behind this increase in 5G power consumption is the high power usage of the active antenna unit (AAU). Under a full workload, a single station uses nearly 3700W.
To improve the energy eficiency of 5G networks, it is imperative to develop sophisticated models that accurately reflect the influence of base station (BS) attributes and operational conditions on energy usage.
What is a 5G base station?
A 5G base station is mainly composed of the baseband unit (BBU) and the AAU — in 4G terms, the AAU is the remote radio unit (RRU) plus antenna. The role of the BBU is to handle baseband digital signal processing, while the AAU converts the baseband digital signal into an analog signal, and then modulates it into a high-frequency radio signal.
What is 5G New Radio?
5G New Radio (NR) is designed to enable denser network deployments and simultaneously deliver increased energy efficiency, thus reducing both operational costs and environmental impacts. Before we explore the new technical features, let's look more closely at how the existing 4G LTE radio networks function.
What is 5G NR?
The 5G NR standard has been designed based on the knowledge of the typical traffic activity in radio networks as well as the need to support sleep states in radio network equipment. By putting the base station into a sleep state when there is no traffic to serve i.e. switching off hardware components, it will consume less energy.