One Step Greener: Reducing 5G and Beyond Networks’ Carbon Footprint by 2-Tiering Energy Efficiency with CO2 Offsetting

Fifth generation (5G) and Beyond-5G (B5G) will be characterized by highly dense deployments, both on network plane and user plane. Internet of Things, massive sensor deployments and base stations will drive even more energy consumption. User behavior towards mobile service usage is witnessing a paradigm shift with heavy capacity, demanding services resulting in an increase of both screen time and data transfers, which leads to additional power consumption. Mobile network operators will face additional energetic challenges, mainly related to power consumption and network sustainability, starting right in the planning phase with concepts like energy efficiency and greenness by design coming into play. The main contribution of this work is a two-tier method to address such challenges leading to positively-offset carbon dioxide emissions related to mobile networks using a novel approach. The first tier contributes to overall power reduction and optimization based on energy efficient methods applied to 5G and B5G networks. The second tier aims to offset the remaining operational power usage by completely offsetting its carbon footprint through geosequestration. This way, we show that the objective of minimizing overall networks’ carbon footprint is achievable. Conclusions are drawn and it is shown that carbon sequestration initiatives or program adherence represent a negligible cost impact on overall network cost, with the added value of greener and more environmentally friendly network operation. This can also relieve the pressure on mobile network operators in order to maximize compliance with environmentally neutral activity.

[1]  Heejung Yu,et al.  5G Ultra-Reliable Low-Latency Communication Implementation Challenges and Operational Issues with IoT Devices , 2019, Electronics.

[2]  Wan Xiaoyu,et al.  Secure Energy-Efficient Resource Allocation Algorithm of Massive MIMO System with SWIPT , 2019 .

[3]  Iftekhar Ahmad,et al.  A Green Communication Model for 5G Systems , 2017, IEEE Transactions on Green Communications and Networking.

[4]  Xiaofeng Tao,et al.  Adaptive Cell Zooming and Sleeping for Green Heterogeneous Ultradense Networks , 2017, IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology.

[5]  Song Guo,et al.  Software-Defined Green 5G System for Big Data , 2018, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[6]  Xiaohua Jia,et al.  Minimizing Energy Cost by Dynamic Switching ON/OFF Base Stations in Cellular Networks , 2016, IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications.

[7]  Yufei Huang,et al.  Energy Efficiency Optimization for Massive MIMO Non-Orthogonal Unicast and Multicast Transmission with Statistical CSI , 2019, Electronics.

[8]  Navrati Saxena,et al.  Artificial Intelligence-Based Discontinuous Reception for Energy Saving in 5G Networks , 2019, Electronics.

[9]  Nirwan Ansari,et al.  On greening cellular networks via multicell cooperation , 2013, IEEE Wireless Communications.

[10]  Peter Millard,et al.  Environmental change and carbon limitation in trees: a biochemical, ecophysiological and ecosystem appraisal. , 2007, The New phytologist.

[11]  Muhammad Ali Imran,et al.  How much energy is needed to run a wireless network? , 2011, IEEE Wireless Communications.

[12]  R. Lal.  Soil carbon sequestration to mitigate climate change , 2004 .

[13]  Mir-Akbar Hessami,et al.  A study of methods of carbon dioxide capture and sequestration: the sustainability of a photosynthetic bioreactor approach , 2004 .

[14]  Jinsong Wu,et al.  Survey of Strategies for Switching Off Base Stations in Heterogeneous Networks for Greener 5G Systems , 2016, IEEE Access.

[15]  Min Chen,et al.  Software-Defined Network Function Virtualization: A Survey , 2015, IEEE Access.

[16]  Mohamed-Slim Alouini,et al.  Green Networking in Cellular HetNets: A Unified Radio Resource Management Framework With Base Station ON/OFF Switching , 2016, IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology.

[17]  Navrati Saxena,et al.  Next Generation 5G Wireless Networks: A Comprehensive Survey , 2016, IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials.

[18]  Didier Colle,et al.  Power consumption in telecommunication networks: overview and reduction strategies , 2011, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[19]  Mugen Peng,et al.  Fog-computing-based radio access networks: issues and challenges , 2015, IEEE Network.

[20]  Yuan Yuan,et al.  A QoE-orientated base station sleeping strategy for multi-services in cellular networks , 2015, 2015 International Conference on Wireless Communications & Signal Processing (WCSP).

[21]  Matti Latva-aho,et al.  Dynamic Clustering and on/off Strategies for Wireless Small Cell Networks , 2015, IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications.

[22]  Gerhard Fettweis,et al.  The global footprint of mobile communications: The ecological and economic perspective , 2011, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[23]  Özlem Durmaz Incel,et al.  QoS vs. energy: A traffic-aware topology management scheme for green heterogeneous networks , 2015, Comput. Networks.

[24]  Bhaskar Krishnamachari,et al.  Base Station Operation and User Association Mechanisms for Energy-Delay Tradeoffs in Green Cellular Networks , 2011, IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications.

[25]  Anders S. G. Andrae,et al.  On Global Electricity Usage of Communication Technology: Trends to 2030 , 2015 .

[26]  Xuelong Li,et al.  Recent Advances in Cloud Radio Access Networks: System Architectures, Key Techniques, and Open Issues , 2016, IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials.

[27]  H. Vincent Poor,et al.  A Survey of Energy-Efficient Techniques for 5G Networks and Challenges Ahead , 2016, IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications.

[28]  Xiaofu Ma,et al.  Next generation public safety networks: A spectrum sharing approach , 2016, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[29]  Iftekhar Ahmad,et al.  Energy Efficient Backhauling for 5G Small Cell Networks , 2019, IEEE Transactions on Sustainable Computing.

[30]  Jeffrey G. Andrews,et al.  What Will 5G Be? , 2014, IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications.

[31]  Atul K. Jain,et al.  Global Carbon Budget 2018 , 2014, Earth System Science Data.

[32]  John A. Raven,et al.  Carbon Sequestration: Photosynthesis and Subsequent Processes , 2006, Current Biology.

[33]  Victor C. M. Leung,et al.  Network Slicing Based 5G and Future Mobile Networks: Mobility, Resource Management, and Challenges , 2017, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[34]  Md. Farhad Hossain,et al.  Green energy driven cellular networks with JT CoMP technique , 2018, Phys. Commun..

[35]  Milenka Mitrovic,et al.  Carbon capture and storage (CCS) demonstration projects in Canada , 2011 .

[36]  Xiaoli Chu,et al.  An Energy Saving Small Cell Sleeping Mechanism with Cell Expansion in Heterogeneous Networks , 2016, 2016 IEEE 83rd Vehicular Technology Conference (VTC Spring).

[37]  S. J. Friedmann,et al.  Geological Carbon Dioxide Sequestration , 2007 .

[38]  Loutfi Nuaymi,et al.  Green Mobile Networks for 5G and Beyond , 2019, IEEE Access.

[39]  Chau Yuen,et al.  Energy Efficiency Tradeoff Mechanism Towards Wireless Green Communication: A Survey , 2016, IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials.

[40]  Zhisheng Niu,et al.  Toward dynamic energy-efficient operation of cellular network infrastructure , 2011, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[41]  Zhisheng Niu,et al.  Cell zooming for cost-efficient green cellular networks , 2010, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[42]  Rui Zhang,et al.  Optimal power and range adaptation for green broadcasting , 2013, 2013 IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC).

[43]  Robert W. Heath,et al.  Five disruptive technology directions for 5G , 2013, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[44]  Henry Leung,et al.  Data-Driven Cell Zooming for Large-Scale Mobile Networks , 2018, IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management.

[45]  Md Saiful Islam,et al.  Self-Adaptive Scheduling of Base Transceiver Stations in Green 5G Networks , 2018, IEEE Access.

[46]  Kemal Davaslioglu,et al.  Quantifying Potential Energy Efficiency Gain in Green Cellular Wireless Networks , 2014, IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials.

[47]  Roger A. Sedjo,et al.  Carbon Sequestration in Forests and Soils , 2012 .

[48]  Ignas G. Niemegeers,et al.  Cooperative Density Estimation in Random Wireless Ad Hoc Networks , 2012, IEEE Communications Letters.

[49]  Jeffrey H. Reed,et al.  Spectrum access system for the citizen broadband radio service , 2015, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[50]  Mohsen Sharifi,et al.  A Survey and Taxonomy of Cyber Foraging of Mobile Devices , 2012, IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials.