Extending the Energy Framework for Network Simulator 3 (ns-3)

TL;DR

This paper extends the ns-3 energy framework to explicitly model energy harvesters, supercapacitors, and energy predictors, enabling more accurate simulations of energy harvesting wireless networks.

Contribution

The authors introduce an extension to the ns-3 energy framework, including new models for energy harvesters, supercapacitors, and energy predictors, improving simulation fidelity.

Findings

Implementation of two simple energy harvester models.

Extension of energy framework with supercapacitor and sensor energy models.

Introduction of an energy predictor concept for future energy estimation.

Abstract

The problem of designing and simulating optimal transmission protocols for energy harvesting wireless networks has recently received considerable attention, thus requiring for an accurate modeling of the energy harvesting process and a consequent redesign of the simulation framework to include it. While the current ns-3 energy framework allows the definition of new energy sources that incorporate the contribution of an energy harvester, the integration of an energy harvester component into an existing energy source is not straightforward using the existing energy framework. In this poster, we propose an extension of the energy framework currently released with ns-3 in order to explicitly introduce the concept of an energy harvester. Starting from the definition of the general interface, we then provide the implementation of two simple models for the energy harvester. In addition, we extend the set of implementations of the current energy framework to include a model for a supercapacitor energy source and a device energy model for the energy consumption of a sensor. Finally, we introduce the concept of an energy predictor, that gathers information from the energy source and harvester and use this information to predict the amount of energy that will be available in the future, and we provide an example implementation. As a result of these efforts, we believe that our contributions to the ns-3 energy framework will provide a useful tool to enhance the quality of simulations of energy-aware wireless networks.