A holistic approach to energy efficiency and sustainability

A conversation with Cristina Rodriguez, Vice President, Wireless Access Network Division, and Alex Quach, Vice President, Wireline and Core Networking Division at Intel Corporation, and Monica Paolini, Principal, Senza Fili

What is the best way to make wireless networks more energy efficient? No single solution will be sufficient to meet operators’ sustainability net-zero goals: we need to think holistically, and act at multiple levels, in different parts of the networks.

Cristina Rodriguez, Vice President, Wireless Access Network Division, and Alex Quach, Vice President, Wireline and Core Networking Division at Intel, shared their views on why we need a holistic approach to energy efficiency – one that spans core and RAN, that starts with Layer 1 virtualization, and that extends to real-time traffic patterns.

We talked about how Open RAN, distributed and centralized networks, and software tools to manage power consumption on real-time traffic demand can reduce power consumption even as traffic volumes go up.

Monica: In the past, operators routinely overprovisioned their networks to ensure performance, leading to excessive power consumption. But now, they can reduce consumption without reducing performance or reliability using software tools.

Open RAN and virtualization give operators the flexibility to decide whether to have a more centralized or distributed RAN topology. How does that affect energy efficiency?

Cristina: Virtualization will always give you more flexibility in the architecture. But to optimize power management, you need virtualization all the way to Layer 1, as well as an end-to-end cloud-native environment. This allows operators to have a common platform and architecture in data centers, at the core and the edge, for distributed and centralized units (DUs and CUs). So imagine how much complexity operators can eliminate by using the software capabilities and upgrades to apply the same artificial intelligence techniques and innovations and the same power management innovations across their networks.

Monica: How should we think about end-to-end energy efficiency?

Cristina: Power optimization requires a holistic approach. We need three elements to maximize energy savings. The first is end-to-end network virtualization all the way to Layer 1. The second is a cloud-native environment. The third is advanced silicon power management software that uses the P-States and C-States.

With Layer 1 virtualization, you can avoid dedicated hardware, and use software to intelligently optimize the processing, resources and power consumption across the entire network.

With a cloud-native environment, operators can deploy composable applications and deliver new services rapidly, using new techniques such as artificial intelligence, and new algorithms.

Finally, with the new silicon capabilities, operators can manage power dynamically following the fluctuation in demand throughout the day.

Even during busy periods, there is fluctuation in demand. Operators can manage power using P‑States to modulate processing frequency and C‑States to put unused CPU cores to sleep. What is game-changing here is that you can bring these cores back in microseconds.

Monica: How much energy savings can operators expect?

Cristina: In a proof-of-concept with Deutsche Telekom, we used their traffic profiles to demonstrate roughly 30% energy savings in Layer 1 signal processing.

In another proof-of-concept with Ericsson, we saw 20% savings in quiet periods and 10% savings in busy periods.

In a O-RAN Alliance Plugfest demo with Vodafone, Wind River, Radisys and Keysight, we saw 12% power savings in the DU and CU with light traffic.

Monica: In the short term, there is some low-hanging fruit to make networks more energy efficient and sustainable. But in the longer term, what do you think will be the key drivers?

Cristina: 6G will absolutely play an important part in increasing energy efficiency, but we do not need to wait for it. We can start today with 5G networks and the capabilities we have today.

There is an understanding across the industry that reducing energy consumption is something we must do now. We have the technology and the capabilities of the silicon to start reaping the benefits of the architecture.

Again, we must adopt a holistic approach and leverage anything we can – hardware, software, and artificial intelligence. AI-driven network optimization and energy management software solutions will help us understand and drive energy efficiency further.

And as we look into the future, we see a tremendous opportunity in harnessing the power of collective innovation in a common platform that everybody understands. We have thousands of programmers worldwide who use open-source tools, and Intel collaborates across the industry ecosystem. We can come together and have a tremendous impact, starting now and continuing through the future.

Alex: We talked about low-hanging fruit, which are capabilities available in products today. So, let's go ahead and get them implemented right away. It is easy stuff to get off the ground.

The advent of analytics as we transition to cloud-native networks is a great promise. Service providers today are still trying to figure out what is the energy consumption of a server, a cluster of servers, or other equipment.

We need low-level telemetry to modulate the CPU frequencies we have been talking about. But we also need network analytics to understand where the power is consumed across the network and where the gaps are.

We will then be able to shut down whole areas or small parts of the network and reap another dimension of power savings with analytics and intelligence.\

Read or watch the full conversation here

A Sparring Partners with Cristina Rodriguez

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