PRESS RELEASE: The China Mobile Research Institute, China Mobile Zhejiang, and Huawei launched their all-new “0 bit, 0 watt” energy saving innovations at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) Shanghai 2023, revealing technical upgrades to the “0 bit, 0 watt” energy saving solutions for equipment and networks. With the upgrades, and for the first time, equipment can enter super deep dormancy and be woken up whenever needed. Moreover, the shutdown ratio of RF modules can reach 99% — the highest in the industry. The upgrades also achieve intent-driven intelligent network energy saving for the first time. This maximizes the energy efficiency of multi-band networks by applying an optimal strategy for each site at each time.

Over the past five years, China Mobile and Huawei have been working on energy saving innovations for wireless networks, with the aim of achieving zero equipment and network energy consumption when there is no traffic. They found that the key to “0 bit, 0 watt” equipment is minimizing energy consumption during off-peak hours, while ensuring instantaneous service experience, and the key to “0 bit, 0 watt” networks is minimizing energy use throughout the day, while meeting differentiated performance requirements.

“0 bit, 0 watt” equipment

China Mobile Zhejiang and Huawei have already tested the “0 bit, 0 watt” equipment solution in Ningbo. The results confirm that this solution allows AAUs to enter super deep dormancy during off-peak hours, which reduces energy consumption to nearly 5 W, and to automatically wake up when the service load increases, in order to ensure user experience.

“0 bit, 0 watt” networks

The China Mobile Research Institute and Huawei have deployed the “0 bit, 0 watt” network solution for complex scenarios. This solution applies intent-driven energy saving based on variables like scenario, service type, and rate target. Site-specific energy saving policies are formulated to strike a balance between service experience and energy savings. Through joint verification, the China Mobile Research Institute and Huawei have demonstrated that this solution substantially reduces network energy consumption, with an average energy saving of 17.6% per day for 5G networks while the network KPIs stay stable.

At the event, Sun Lei, a senior researcher at the Department of Wireless and Terminal Technology Research, which is part of the China Mobile Research Institute, noted that the “0 bit, 0 watt” innovations mark a milestone in China Mobile’s longstanding efforts to achieve service-based energy usage. Sun also added that the institute will continue to work with Huawei to maintain innovation efforts and meet both China Mobile’s and the country’s goals for carbon emission reductions.

Wei Qiang, General Manager of China Mobile Zhejiang’s Planning Technology Department, said: “We’re committed to improving user experience and increasing energy savings for 5G networks, and have been focusing our innovation efforts on these objectives. Our collaboration with Huawei on the ‘0 bit, 0 watt’ solution has helped us deliver better network experience and save more energy.”

Solari Yu, President of Huawei’s SingleRAN Product Line, noted that “0 bit, 0 watt” is one of Huawei’s major energy saving initiatives for wireless equipment and networks. Huawei will continue to work with China Mobile to apply the “0 bit, 0 watt” technology to more wireless products and explore more energy saving ideas, in order to help China Mobile and other operators worldwide build green 5G networks.