Mechanism design for energy efficiency in wireless networks

Network mechanism design aims to achieve system level goals such as efficiency or social welfare maximization through resource allocation mechanisms on networks, where individual users are selfish and independent decision-makers. This paper focuses on mechanisms for energy efficiency in uplink of multi-carrier wireless systems and rate control in wireless networks. The problem is modeled as strategic (nonco-operative) game with a resource pricing scheme, where the prices are imposed by a mechanism designer. The users decide on their actions according to both own preferences and given prices. The rules and incentives of the mechanism are designed in such a way that the system objective which is a combination of social welfare and energy efficiency is maximized. A weighting parameter in the objective function allows to smoothly vary the emphasis from social welfare to energy efficiency according to the preference of the designer. The users are assumed initially to be concerned only about their throughput. However, the designer modifies their incentives using pricing so that they become more energy-aware. A distributed optimization framework is developed accordingly in which users have general concave utilities (in terms of throughput) that are unknown to the designer and the energy-efficiency objective is expressed as a convex function of user power levels. An iterative pricing mechanism is obtained as a result, and illustrated through simulations.