Handover Management Based on RSSI, Load and Velocity in Dense Green Heterogeneous Networks

In next-generation wireless networks, the demand for higher rates and seamless mobility have been considered as major challenges. To meet the ever increasing demands in rates and capacities, the deployment of heterogeneous networks (HetNets) is proposed as a key solution. In this paper, in order to reduce the energy consumption of base stations (BSs) in HetNets, a sleep mode approach is applied. In this approach, an opportunistic ON/OFF switching technique based on a non-cooperative game is used. In order to solve the game, a distributed learning algorithm is utilized. Moreover, we propose two handover (HO) algorithms. The first HO algorithm is based on the received signal strength indicator (RSSI) and load. In order to reduce the number of HOs, we also propose another algorithm based on RSSI, load and velocity, where high-speed user equipments are encouraged to connect to macro base stations. Simulation results indicate that the proposed algorithms reduce the average number of HOs and improve the energy efficiency (EE) of the network compared to the benchmark algorithms.