By Ivan Perallon, Technetix Inc.
Through the 2015 Paris Agreement [1], governments of the world committed to curbing global temperature rise to well-below 2°C above pre-industrial levels. To achieve this, greenhouse gas emissions(GHG) must halve by 2030 – and drop to net-zero by 2050. Ambitious but crucial, it’s a challenge an increasing number of companies across every sector are accepting. Telecommunications is no exception.
On the other hand, in the era of digital transformation, access networks play a pivotal role in delivering high-speed internet services to end-users. However, the growing demand for high-speed internet connectivity typically involves higher-order signal modulation and/or larger bandwidth spectrum. These two approaches to increase the network throughput necessarily entail higher levels of transmitted power, both in wireless and wireline networks.
Hybrid fiber-coaxial (HFC) access networks, combination of fiber and coaxial cable technologies, have long been a cornerstone of broadband infrastructure and still represent a 50% market share in North America [2]. Between 44 and 50% of the power consumption of cable operators is consumed by the outside plant according to the latest research from SCTE Energy 20/20 Program [3]. Traditional network operators implement a drop-in approach to maintain amplifier legacy locations by installing a new amplifier module with higher downstream and/or upstream bandwidth, helping minimize upgrade downtime and cost. As coaxial cables present higher attenuation at higher frequencies, amplifier output levels must be raised. This trend, together with the growing deployment of Wi-Fi access points and 5G small cells powered by the HFC network, leads to believe that the previously mentioned 44-50% ratio of power consumed by cable operators will only increase in the short and mid-term.
A big contributor to GHG emissions is electrical energy consumption.
Within this framework, this paper analyzes the power efficiency that traditionally powered outside plant HFC networks obtain, proposes a revolutionary idea based on smart low frequency alternating current (AC) powering and presents the results acquired during the tests performed at a laboratory.