Green heterogeneous network with load balancing in LTE-A systems

Heterogeneous networks (HetNets) have been considered as a promising technique for improving spectral efficiency, but the energy efficiency influenced by the fluctuation of user numbers should not be neglected to achieve green communications. We introduce the energy-efficient switch-off mode algorithm for pico cells to reduce power consumption in the self-organizing network (SON). Once the switch-off mode is initiated in some picked pico cells, the users connecting to these cells would face the problem of redistribution. In this paper, we introduce the energy saving (ES) strategy based on the prediction of load capability to select pico cells to enter switchoff mode. Furthermore, network flow based load balancing (LB) is proposed to provide solution of uneven load status caused by ES. System level simulations are conducted to exhibit the performance enhancement that the proposed algorithm can reduce energy consumption as well as improve the balanced degree of resource allocation significantly.