LTE and Wi-Fi Coexistence in Unlicensed Spectrum with Application to Smart Grid: A Review

TL;DR

This review paper examines coexistence strategies for LTE and Wi-Fi in unlicensed spectrum, focusing on applications in smart grid communication, and discusses challenges, solutions, and performance comparisons.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive review of LTE-Wi-Fi coexistence schemes, addressing deployment challenges and evaluating potential solutions for smart grid applications.

Findings

LTE and Wi-Fi can coexist with proper schemes

LBT-based LTE and CSMA/CA Wi-Fi show comparable performance

Implementation in smart grid is feasible with current coexistence techniques

Abstract

Long Term Evolution (LTE) is expanding its utilization in unlicensed band by deploying LTE Unlicensed (LTEU) and Licensed Assisted Access LTE (LTE-LAA) technology. Smart Grid can take the advantages of unlicensed bands for achieving two-way communication between smart meters and utility data centers by using LTE-U/LTE-LAA. However, both schemes must co-exist with the incumbent Wi-Fi system. In this paper, several co-existence schemes of Wi-Fi and LTE technology is comprehensively reviewed. The challenges of deploying LTE and Wi-Fi in the same band are clearly addressed based on the papers reviewed. Solution procedures and techniques to resolve the challenging issues are discussed in a short manner. The performance of various network architectures such as listenbefore- talk (LBT) based LTE, carrier sense multiple access with collision avoidance (CSMA/CA) based Wi-Fi is briefly compared. Finally, an attempt is made to implement these proposed LTEWi- Fi models in smart grid technology.