Wireless over cable for energy-efficient femtocell systems

Recently, network architectures based on high-density cells with reduced transmit power have been claimed as a promising solution for energy efficiency enhancement. Cell size reduction down to the range 10–50m is the paradigm of femtocells, based on low-cost, user-deployed in-house base stations connected to the operator's core network through DSL links. However, in dense urban scenarios, radio interference arising from multiple femtocells sharing the same spectrum can result in detrimental throughput degradation, with the straightforward consequence of increasing the effective amount of consumed energy per delivered information bit. In this paper, capitalizing on the Distributed Antennas System (DAS) paradigm, we propose a new Wireless over Cable architecture for femtocells (named FemtoWoC architecture) as a green solution that prevents the need of xDSL equipments for connections over cable, and enhances throughput performances through centralized resource management and interference mitigation for multiple femtocells. Benefits of the FemtoWoC solution with respect to the conventional scheme are investigated through simulations by accounting for a realistic LTE cellular deployment.