Green Heterogeneous Wireless Networks

Chapter 3Green Multi-homing Approach

The wireless communication medium has become a heterogeneous environment with overlapped coverages due to the coexistence of different cells (macro, micro, pico and femto), networks (cellular networks, WLANs and WMANs) and technologies (RF, VLC and D2D communications). In such a networking environment, MTs are equipped with multiple radio interfaces. Through multi-homing capability, an MT can maintain multiple simultaneous associations with different networks. Besides improving the achieved data rate through bandwidth aggregation, the heterogeneous wireless medium together with the multi-homing service can boost energy efficiency of network operators and mobile users. This is mainly due to the vast diversity in fading channels and propagation losses among MTs and BSs, available resources and operating frequency bands of different networks. This chapter mainly focuses on promoting energy efficiency in wireless networks through multi-homing resource allocation, exploiting network cooperation and integrating different and new network technologies such as RF and VLC. In such a network setting, a joint bandwidth and power allocation approach, for uplink and downlink communications, can promote energy savings for both mobile users and network operators. In this chapter, we first present the heterogeneous wireless communication medium, then discuss the potentials of multi-homing approach in green communications and focus on several challenging issues ...