Carbon emissions and sustainability of launching 5G mobile networks in China

TL;DR

This study develops a data-driven framework to estimate and mitigate carbon emissions from China's 5G networks, proposing DeepEnergy to improve energy efficiency and achieve significant emission reductions and net-zero goals.

Contribution

The paper introduces DeepEnergy, a novel deep reinforcement learning and graph neural network-based method to optimize energy use in 5G networks, reducing emissions and avoiding efficiency traps.

Findings

Estimated additional carbon emissions of 23.82 megatons due to efficiency decline.

DeepEnergy could help over 71% of provinces avoid carbon traps.

Applying DeepEnergy and solar energy could reduce 20.90 megatons of emissions in 2023.

Abstract

Since 2021, China has deployed more than 2.1 million 5G base stations to increase the network capacity and provide ubiquitous digital connectivity for mobile terminals. However, the launch of 5G networks also exacerbates the misalignment between cellular traffic and energy consumption, which reduces carbon efficiency - the amount of network traffic that can be delivered for each unit of carbon emission. In this study, we develop a large-scale data-driven framework to estimate the carbon emissions induced by mobile networks. We show that the decline in carbon efficiency leads to a carbon efficiency trap, estimated to cause additional carbon emissions of 23.82 +- 1.07 megatons in China. To mitigate the misalignment and improve energy efficiency, we propose DeepEnergy, an energy-saving method leveraging collaborative deep reinforcement learning and graph neural networks. DeepEnergy models complex collaboration among cells, making it possible to effectively coordinate the working state of tens of thousands of cells, which could help over 71% of Chinese provinces avoid carbon efficiency traps. In addition, applying DeepEnergy is estimated to reduce 20.90 +- 0.98 megatons of carbon emissions at the national level in 2023. We further assess the effects of adopting renewable energy and discover that the mobile network could accomplish more than 50% of its net-zero goal by integrating DeepEnergy and solar energy systems. Our study provides insight into carbon emission mitigation in 5G network infrastructure launching in China and overworld, paving the way towards achieving sustainable development goals and future net-zero mobile networks.