Performance analysis of soft frequency reuse for inter-cell interference coordination in LTE networks

Due to the requirement of high spectrum efficiency, the frequency reuse of one is targeted for next generation OFDMA-based cellular networks. Such a frequency planning strategy can lead to unacceptable inter-cell interference levels experienced especially by users located at the cell edge area. Soft frequency reuse (SFR) is considered as an effective frequency reuse scheme for inter-cell interference coordination as well as maintaining spectrum efficiency. In this paper, we investigate the performance of SFR for LTE downlink transmission by considering issues of various traffic loads and different power ratio configurations. In addition to the cell-edge user performance, the overall cell performance and the cell-center user performance are both evaluated in terms of throughput estimation. Using simulation studies, the advantages and limitations of SFR are comprehensively examined and compared against the classical frequency reuse of one scheme.