Output power distributions of terminals in a 3G mobile communication network

• Published in: Bioelectromagnetics 2012-05, Vol.33 (4), p.320-325
• Main Authors: Persson, Tomas, Törnevik, Christer, Larsson, Lars-Eric, Lovén, Jan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Cell Phone - instrumentation; Cities - statistics & numerical data; Computer Communication Networks - statistics & numerical data; electromagnetic field exposure; mobile communication; mobile phone output power; network measurements
• ISSN: 0197-8462; 1521-186X
• DOI: 10.1002/bem.20710

The objective of this study was to examine the distribution of the output power of mobile phones and other terminals connected to a 3G network in Sweden. It is well known that 3G terminals can operate with very low output power, particularly for voice calls. Measurements of terminal output power were conducted in the Swedish TeliaSonera 3G network in November 2008 by recording network statistics. In the analysis, discrimination was made between rural, suburban, urban, and dedicated indoor networks. In addition, information about terminal output power was possible to collect separately for voice and data traffic. Information from six different Radio Network Controllers (RNCs) was collected during at least 1 week. In total, more than 800000 h of voice calls were collected and in addition to that a substantial amount of data traffic. The average terminal output power for 3G voice calls was below 1 mW for any environment including rural, urban, and dedicated indoor networks. This is