Energy efficient hybrid-powered communication systems using joint adaptive power allocation and energy exchange

Abstract

The spread in the use of wireless services resulted in a remarkable growth of power consumption for telecommunication systems to satisfy the continuous growth of data demand. On the other hand, the emergence of smart grids and the expansion of low-cost distributed powering solutions represented an opportunity to enhance the energy efficiency and improve communication systems' costs. In this paper, we propose to enhance the energy efficiency of self-powered wireless networks by exploiting the possibility of energy exchange between different micro-grids. The objective is to exploit the flexibility and non homogeneity of communication services' demand to maximize the global utility. Cooperation between cells is exploited to exchange additional/needed power as function of their respective users' demands and energy availabilities. While taking into consideration the power losses due to this exchange, we propose an efficient approach to allocate the available resources across the different cells. Numerical simulations show the gains that can be achieved due to this approach as a function of the demand and energy availability variations.