JultikaUniversity of Oulu repository

Abstract

5G or fifth-generation mobile network is being developed to meet the massive increase in data and connectivity, and it connects billions of devices via the internet of things. A significant advantage of 5G is the fast response time, also known as latency, which is delivered by faster connections and greater capacity. As 5G is using high frequencies such as above 6GHz, people are concerned about this electromagnetic field (EMF) exposure because it uses a large number of transmitters. The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) issued guidelines to protect humans and the environment from radio frequency electro magnetic field (RF-EMF) exposure in the frequency range of 100kHz-300GHz. These constraints are expressed in terms of specific absorption rate (SAR), electric and magnetic field strength, and power density.

The goal of this thesis is to analyse the impact of EMF exposure in 5G deployment. The first step was to examine the EMF and its characteristics in general and in 5G in particular. Characteristics of 5G which are relevant to the electromagnetic field were then analyzed. The regulations related to human exposure to EMF were investigated globally, regionally, and in selected countries and compared with the key parameters including incident electric field strength, incident magnetic field strength, and incident power strength. To analyze the impact of the EMF in 5G two methods were used to assess EMF exposure: calculating the minimum distance and assessing the power density. Power density assessments were done for three different frequency bands (700MHz,1800MHz, and 3.5GHz), five different environmental scenarios (indoor hotspot, dense urban, rural, urban macro massive machine-type communications (mMTC), urban micro ultra-reliable low-latency communications (URLLC), and four different scenarios of a typical 5G network (indoor hotspot, dense urban, micro, micro remote radio head (RRH)), and by co-locating the three transmitters in the frequency bands 700MHz,1800MHz and 3.5GHz.

The results of the power density assessment in frequency bands 700MHz,1800Mhz, and 3.5GHz show that there is no EMF exposure near the transmitters. However, with the simulation results, we can see that there is an EMF exposure near the transmitter when considering various scenarios such as dense urban, rural, urban macro mMTC, urban micro URLLC, micro and micro remote radio head (RRH). With the simulation results of co-locating transmitters also we can see that there is also EMF exposure close to the transmitters. So, when deploying the 5G network in these environmental conditions, EMF regulations and limitations should be taken into greater account and deployment should be carried out to minimize this exposure. Thus, when planning the 5G network this exposed area should be included as a restricted area that the general public cannot access.