Panasonic’s Green Tower solution flips energy infrastructure management paradigm for mobile network operators
Physical infrastructure investment and maintenance is one of the largest recurring costs for mobile network operators tasked with constantly increasing coverage and capacity to keep up with booming demand for mobile data.
A major opex component is securing reliable, sustainable power to tower assets in a manner that enables real-time monitoring of mission critical communications resources.
Consider the numbers: Up to 15% of total opex for cellular network comes from electricity costs. And that’s in mature markets. In developing markets with unreliable grids and dependency on diesel-powered generators, the cost can jump up to 50%.
In a telecommunications landscape marked by outsourcing to niche experts, energy, just like software or compute power, is a service. Panasonic has adopted this Energy as a Service model in its Green Tower solution.
Catrina Chatelain of Panasonic Enterprise Solutions laid out the Green Tower value proposition in an interview with RCR Wireless News: “Green Tower’s opex-based approach to energy infrastructure management provides intelligent control assets for enhanced network reliability support by real-time data analysis, smart energy generation and storage for grid back-up, off-grid, unreliable grid, and grid arbitrage in cellular and WiFi applications.”
“We are enabling mobile network operators to keep critical communications infrastructure up and running at reduced costs,” she said.
Panasonic developed this end-to-end solution with PowerOasis, which specializes in using cloud computing to provide remote monitoring and sensing of power and battery technologies across sectors and industries.
The Green Tower solution provides numerous benefits to operators:
- Eliminates life-threatening downtime with advanced energy management and network redundancy features.
- Ensures network resiliency beyond grid power availability with li-ion battery storage, solar power generation and satellite connectivity.
- Enables customers to reduce costs and avoid capex with an opex-based Energy-as-a-Service model.
- Provides configurable size and weight advantages for deployment at restricted sites.
“Power consumption and energy costs are expected to rise in lock-step with the staggering increase in mobile device use,” Chatelain explained. “Meanwhile, the telecom industry faces challenges from mother nature and power grid instability, which can interrupt service creating the need for operators to turn to expensive fixes like lead-acid batteries or diesel generators. We can solve those problems with a cost-effective, environmentally-friendly solution that provides reliable, stable energy.”
For more information on how to harden your network while cutting recurring costs with Panasonic’s Green Tower, click here.
