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.

Is 5G more energy efficient than 4G?

Although the absolute value of the power consumption of 5G base stations is increasing, their energy efficiency ratio is much lower than that of 4G stations. In other words, with the same power consumption, the network capacity of 5G will be as dozens of times larger than 4G, so the power consumption per bit is sharply reduced.

Why does 5G use so much power?

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. This necessitates a number of updates to existing networks, such as more powerful supplies and increased performance output from supporting facilities.

Should power consumption models be used in 5G networks?

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.

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.

Does 5G New Radio save energy?

Emerging use cases and devices demand higher capacity from today’s mobile networks, leading to increasingly dense network deployments. In this post, we explore the energy saving features of 5G New Radio and how this enables operators to build denser networks, meet performance demands and maintain low 5G energy consumption.