China Tower and Huawei Conduct Joint Innovation Test on Intelligent Energy Solutions

• The power consumption of new base stations greatly increases, with existing base stations face capacity expansion and reconstruction. However, mains capacity expansion costs are high and take a long time, which severely affects the pace of deployment while greatly increasing investment. In addition, the DC power system, batteries, and air conditioners at most existing sites need to be expanded and reconstructed.
• In the remote scenario of high-power active antenna units (AAUs), the cable loss is high. The remote voltage is even lower than the operating voltage of the AAU in some cases. As a result, the AAU cannot work.

To address the issues in the site construction and O&M and formulate a comprehensive power supply solution for new sites, China Tower and Huawei agreed a joint innovation initiation in December 2018 and set up a joint working team to lower investment, reduce OPEX, and achieve intelligent O&M. The intelligent energy joint innovation test was conducted on multiple topics, such as insufficient mains capacity in special scenarios, peak load shaving, and intelligent battery management and accurate configuration.

The entire process, from 5G network power supply requirement reviews and test case designs to comprehensive tests, was conducted an expert team from China Tower and Huawei Network Energy Product Line. Based on the industry's first intelligent power supply solution provided by Huawei, the test, which was conducted in Hangzhou, China verifies the functions of intelligent peak shaving, intelligent voltage boosting, and intelligent energy storage.

The site in Hefeng Village is used as an example. The average load is 1.4 kW, while the peak load is 2.7 kW, and the AC power limit is 1.6 kW. When 5G services are simulated, the peak load exceeds the power limit and lithium batteries start to power the load to achieve intelligent peak shaving. When the load is light, lithium batteries immediately switch to the equalized charging mode. Huawei's iTelecomPower Solution intelligently controls batteries and air conditioners based on a sites power consumption and mains capacity to achieve "no mains change" and thereby reduces the capital investment when sites evolve to the network.

In addition, the team also tested various intelligent features such as intelligent solar access, hybrid use of lead-acid and lithium batteries (battery pooling), and mixed use of old and new power supplies (power pooling) to verify the on-demand battery and power supply configuration and modular evolution.

"This joint innovation provides insight into the iTelecomPower solution of China Tower," said Tong Kebo, General Manager of the Technical Support Center, Zhejiang Branch of China Tower. "Intelligent peak shaving and voltage boosting addresses long periods and high costs caused by mains and cable reconstruction. The hybrid use of smart lithium batteries and old lead-acid batteries refines our backup power supply and maximizes the value of our investment. The success of this innovative test breaks the limitations of traditional solutions on new site construction and O&M, and is of great significance for large-scale 5G commercial use by China Tower."

The joint innovation test between Huawei and China Tower on intelligent energy solutions will help build sustainable infrastructure in the 5G era, strengthen the ability to cope with climate change, and contribute to the achievement of Goal 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure and Goal 13: Climate Action in the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In 2018, Huawei iTelecomPower Solution won the "5G Green Energy Industry Strength Award" by People's Posts and Telecommunications News, an authoritative newspaper in China's communication and information industry.