Congestion Relief on Power-Controlled CDMA Networks

Abstract

A digital cellular radio Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) system can only support a finite number of users before the interference plus noise power density, Io, received at the cellular base station causes an unacceptable frame-error rate. Once the maximum interference level is reached, new arrivals should be blocked. In a power-controlled CDMA system, the base station can direct mobiles to reduce their power and data rate to reduce interference and allow more users on the system. This approach is employed in TIA 75-95 with respect to the time-varying voice activity on cellular voice channels. In this paper, we investigate an alternative technique where we adjust the power and data rate of mobile data users to the time-varying interference level to allow more users on a congested system. This scheme was simulated for various proportions of voice and data users and offered traffic levels. Blocking probabilities are reduced in some cases by two orders of magnitude. Message wait time, now a random variable, may exceed the wait time for a constant rate system at high traffic levels. If the cellular carrier has a maximum blocking requirement, an adaptive rate/power system can increase capacity. For example, a base station that normally supports 26.4 Erlangs offered traffic with 2% blocking can support 33.5 Erlangs with the same blocking probability if adaptive rates and power control are used. Thus, the adaptive rate system increases capacity by 27%.