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At the end of 2007, China Mobile positioned itself as the first Chinese operator to launch a new, green equipment purchase strategy. Promoting energy conservation and environmental protection as key indices for supplier selection, China Mobile publicized its first shortlist comprising 4 vendors of mobile communication main equipment and 11 vendors of auxiliary equipment. This crucial and environmentally forward-thinking move has undoubtedly imposed enormous pressures on the suppliers failing to be shortlisted.

Today"s global telecom market has embraced energy conservation and environmental protection as a new arena for competition between telecom equipment vendors. Telecom equipment vendors are not strange to this green concept now, and the nascent purchasing strategies of operators have catalyzed the green agenda"s rise to the forefront of the supply chain.

A green storm is coming

The features of the Chinese telecom market act as a microcosm of the global telecom industry, and the green storm is shaking the industry by its roots. Studies concerning energy conservation standards in the global IT and telecom industries are underway, and numerous operator-led environmental protection regulations have been successively unveiled. The ITU-T, for example, is spearheading a far-reaching ICT energy conservation and emission reduction program. Having already launched a research project spanning GPON energy conservation in February 2008, ITU-T"s target for its broader scheme involves consecutive 15% reductions in energy consumption over each of coming 4 years.

At the annual conference covering Network Equipment-Building System on November 6, 2007, the Telecommunications Carriers Group (TCG) worked out specific programs for the formulation and issuance of energy conservation standards. This has been consolidated by European and American developments in April 2008. The Environment Engineering Technical Committee of the European Telecommunication Standardization Institute (ETSI EE) organized a conference on emission reduction in Bordeaux and, as a result, numerous vendors—including Huawei, Nokia Siemens Networks, and Ericsson—agreed to form their own base station energy conservation standards under the ETSI EE standards" framework.

In North America, the Telecommunication Energy Efficiency (TEE) of the Network Interface, Power, and Protection Committee of the Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions (ATIS NIPP) came into being after the April 2008 conference that centered on energy conservation and environmental protection.

Viewing the latest related progress in the global communications industry, we can see that product-based energy conservation and emission reduction have extended to environmental protection across the entire network lifecycle. Each link of the following closed loop system is to be imbued with a green core: demand - design - research - manufacture - supply chain - deployment - recycling - demand.

Currently, operators and vendors are prioritizing a holistic environmental protection ethos that not only consists of energy conservation and emission reduction in network entities, but also in network operations. British Telecom (BT), for example, has gone as far as to lay down specific regulations covering water usage and fuel consumption by engineering vehicles during network operation and maintenance (O&M).

China Mobile"s green initiative

The communications industry has become an important arena for the whole society to implement energy conservation and environmental protection.

On June 4, 2007, China issued its China"s National Climate Change Program, which indicates that energy conservation and emission reduction has become a national drive. The 11th Five-Year Plan and the Report to The 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) project that 2010 will realize an energy consumption reduction per unit of GDP by 20%, compared with the 2005 level. This also marks the incorporation of energy conservation and emission reduction into the government"s performance assessment system for state-owned telecom enterprises. On June 15, 2007, China announced the formation of its dedicated working group charged with formulating environmental protection standards for communications products. At the beginning of 2008, China Mobile declared environmental protection as its inherent duty in its Corporate Social Responsibility Report, which directly gave rise to its Green Program.

At present, thousands of SPC switches and over 600,000 BTSs exist in China. The scale of networks—especially mobile networks—is rapidly expanding, and the demand for energy is growing in parallel. Data indicates that energy consumption per USD1470 of added value forms one seventh of the average national economic performance and one fifteenth of the average industrial performance. In the telecom industry, the GDP per kilowatt-hour is approximately USD5.9, five to six times the national average. This data demonstrates that, compared with other industries, energy consumption in the communications industry is not especially pervasive in terms of direct and added value. However, there is still much room for energy conservation and emission reduction in the telecom field.

BTS energy consumption accounts for about 70% of the total energy used by mobile operators. If China Mobile builds 3 million new carriers over the next 3 years, Huawei predicts that it will curtail power consumption by about 2.5 billion kilowatt-hours. This can be achieved by adopting products with high integration and energy-efficient capacities, reconstructing equipment rooms, and upgrading legacy BTSs with green software. The beneficial effects of these measures equal a 17 million ton decrease in CO2 emissions.

As the telecom operator with the globally largest market value, China Mobile plans to cut 2005 energy consumption levels per unit business volume by 30% by 2010, which will save approximately 8 billion kilowatt-hours.

China Mobile is deploying its green strategy at each network level. In 2007, for example, it formulated the China Mobile Base Station Energy Conservation Technical Protocols. The company is also ratifying technical specifications for core network equipment, which it plans to release in 2008. China Telecom, another major Chinese operator, has established a cross-departmental working group charged with conserving energy and reducing emissions. In this context, China Telecom has incorporated energy efficiency and CAPEX reduction targets into its purchasing strategy. As such, all equipment providers will be tested under this uniform standard.

Huawei gains soft power in green telecom

Objectively, energy conservation and environmental protection present a big challenge for operating expenditure (OPEX) control. However, the two also form an opportunity for communications enterprises to promote their soft power capabilities. BT, for example, has acquired orders from Scotland"s Edinburgh council based on BT"s green capabilities. This reflects the BT"s sustained investment and commitment to environmental protection. 

Stringent requirements have aligned operators with energy conservation and environmental protection goals. The impact on the operational characteristics of communications equipment vendors has been far-reaching, including strict or even harsh testing on soft power capability. Huawei"s tremendous success in Europe in 2007 was largely inspired by its strategic and intensive investment in green technologies. It is generally accepted that European operators lead in the energy conservation and environmental protection area. Among them, the energy conservation platforms seen in Telecom Italia"s access network and Vodafone"s BTSs form two industry benchmarks; in both, Huawei played a pivotal role.

As an important participator in the global communications market, Huawei attaches great importance to energy conservation and environmental protection and, as a result, it emerged as one of the four equipment suppliers selected as a partner for China Mobile"s Green Action Plan. Since 2007, Huawei has carried out progressive talks regarding environmental issues with globally leading operators, including China Mobile, Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom, Telecom Italia, etc.. Huawei has closely cooperated with upstream and downstream enterprises and has remained at the forefront of the green telecom era.

The new generation green mobile network unveiled at the beginning of 2008 describes a good example of current developments. It employs innovative technologies such as advanced power amplification, multi-carrier, distributed BTSs, intelligent temperature control, and so on. The number of base station controller (BSC) cabinets is reduced from five to one, and BTS capacity is up from 12 carriers to 36. The resulting demand on equipment room area is lessened significantly, yielding engineering installation benefits. In turn, the number of sites and air conditioners is far lower. Energy consumption per BTS is reduced from 1600W to 800W; clean energy sources, such as methane, solar, and wind power, enable operators to realize energy, material, land, and labor conservation; CO2 emission and OPEX, for instance, are down 60% and 30% respectively. Undoubtedly, this network will bring about economic gains for operators and fulfill their social responsibility pledges.

Huawei is set to be among the first enterprises to reconstruct its organizational structure and product R&D and manufacturing process to embody a green-centric core. To date, Huawei has implemented whole-process management and whole-series product coverage to further its conservation and protection strategies. Huawei"s energy conservation and emission reduction system encapsulates all its product lines including networks, wireless systems, core networks, service and software, terminals; and all its systems such as R&D, marketing & sales, technical services, and supply chain. Moreover, there are affiliated regular organizations including working groups dedicated in energy conservation and emission reduction, and standards constitution. Each of Huawei"s product line and system has dedicated staff to guarantee the effective and holistic implementation of Huawei"s energy conservation and environmental protection strategy.

An immense push has brought Huawei a series of high-level accomplishments. In June 2008, the world-famous consulting institute In-Stat issued a report entitled Mobile Communications 2008: Green Thinking Beyond TCO Consideration; the report declared Huawei"s evident strengths in many key energy conservation and emission reduction indices, and revealed Huawei to be the leading strategist for green mobile network realization.