CEPT

FM49(13)028

ECC

Electronic Communications Committee

FM 49 Radio Spectrum for BB PPDR

Oslo, 13 June - 14 June 2013
Date issued:

6 June 2013

Source:

Cassidian, Alcatel-Lucent

Subject:

Technical comparison between 400 and 700 MHz

Password protection required? (Y/N)

Proposal:
FM PT49 is invited to consider this contribution as a contribution for
report B, especially for the completion of the section dedicated to the
technical comparison between the two options retained for BB PPDR
WAN.
Note that some alignments with existing and similar considerations into
report A (now ECC report 199) may be necessary.

1 Introduction
This contribution aims at delivering inputs for FM49 Report B, especially for the section
dedicated to frequency options. At this stage of the contribution, it has to be noticed that some
alignments with existing FM49 outcomes, especially with regards to the ECC Report 199 may
be necessary.

2 Assumptions
This section introduces various link budgets assumptions to compare the coverage of 400 and
700 MHz cells using the LTE technology.

Link Budget Parameters

The considered LTE system is using a 5 MHz channel width, i.e. 25 resource blocks (RBs) of
180 kHz each. The uplink transmission is limited to 5 resource blocks per user equipment (UE),
which represents a reasonable trade-off between throughput, power spread and bandwidth
noise increase.
Base stations (BS) antenna gains have been retrieved from real products (Kathrein) relevant
with the targeted mobile applications, especially regarding their capability to support MIMO
transmission scheme for the two considered frequency bands (2 Tx antennas and 2 Rx
antennas).
User equipment has been considered as vehicle mounted equipment as this is representing
significantly the PPDR usages. Considered car installation allows SIMO transmission scheme in
uplink and MIMO transmission in downlink (1 Tx antenna and 2 Rx antennas). Antenna gains
have been set to 2 dBi, a typical value for car antennas in both 400 and 700 MHz ranges. By
analogy with narrowband systems, UE transmission power has been set up at 5 W (37 dBm) in
order to allow significant uplink throughput. Please note that regulation considerations may lead
to decrease such a transmission power as for Band 14 (US PPDR Frequency band, adjacent to
commercial LTE band) where the maximum has been set at 31 dBm (1.2 W), or even at lower
level. Ultimately, allowed maximum transmission power in 400 and 700 MHz may be different
depending on co-existing systems in adjacent bands.
As LTE is designed to operate with a frequency re-use pattern of 1, extra-cell interferences are
taken into account by considering a noise rise margin independent of the frequency band but
linked to the network load, the SINR (Signal to Interference and Noise Ratio) targeted at the cell
edge and the type of antenna configuration. In this paper, the noise rise has been set at 3 dB
which represents a typical value for tri-sectorial roll-out.
SINR has been set at -3.5 dB as coverage is clearly the design driver for PPDR but also to be
consistent with the former noise rise assumption.
To ease the comparison, no other margin as for confidence level has been considered. In this
case, where maximum coverage is targeted, the LTE system is not limited by interferences but
the effect of interferences is almost equivalent to the effect of noise at the edge of coverage.
Last but not least, link budgets presented below are balanced link budgets. This has been
achieved by limiting the transmission power of the Base Stations to 25 W whereas 60 W are
reachable values at both 400 and 700 MHz. The impact of reducing Terminal maximum output
power was also considered.

Discussion on Diversity gains

The question of diversity gain at terminal side has arisen in former FM49 contributions and
discussions. For a vehicle installation the system benefits from full diversity gains since, in this
case, the two receiving antennas can be sufficiently separated to ensure a good decorrelation of

the fading observed on each of them. The question is more complex in the case of a handheld,
i.e. a Smartphone-like PPDR terminal.
Two different types of diversity can be considered. The first one is the space diversity where
antennas are separated in distance (at least 1 lambda); the signals seen on each antenna are
experiencing different and independent fading conditions. The second one is the polarization
diversity; since the signals during the reflections on obstacles are depolarized, the orientation of
the received wave is changed in a random manner. This creates behaviour of the fading that is
independent in two orthogonal directions (let say vertical one and horizontal one). So if the
antennas of the terminal are orthogonal, then there is a gain of polarization diversity.
Space diversity is due to the fact that a terminal is operating in an environment of interference
fringes which are created by reflection on the obstacles surrounding the terminal. The
characteristics of these interference fringes are quite complex, and for a supposed regular
distribution of obstacles around the terminal, a moving terminal is experiencing a Rayleigh
fading. In order to estimate the correlation of the fading received by the 2 antennas, we use the
formula of the correlation of the fading, depending on the delay of reception between the 2
antennas. The diversity correlation is derived from this correlation formula. The correlation
depends only on the distance between the antennas and the wavelength. The methods to
determine the correlation level between the two antennas is provided in Annex 1 to this
contribution.
It can be observed from the considerations provided in Annex that, in the range of interest, i.e.
for a BER before channel decoding between 1% and 10%, that at 700 MHz there is a relative
decorrelation gain compared to 400 MHz of approximately 0.5 to 1 dB. After channel decoding
but also considering that LTE is using advanced repetition mechanism, the relative gain is
expected to be similar. Moreover this gain will impact the available throughput at a given
distance. This impact is expected to represent approximately 7% difference for the throughput.
In addition to this space diversity gain, there is polarization diversity gain. This gain appears if
the two antennas are, at least partly, orthogonal. This can be the case for example with patch
antennas. This polarization diversity gain adds to the antenna gain. The polarization diversity
gain is not dependant with the frequency. It depends on the geometry of the antennas.
To summarize, space diversity gain difference can be neglected (very limited impact on
available throughput) whereas polarisation diversity gain is not going to be considered into the
following sections as providing similar gains at 400 and 700 MHz for smartphones.

3 Link Budgets
400 MHz Downlink Link Budget
Transmitter
BS Tx Power (2 PA)

47

BS Antenna Gain
BS Cable Loss
EIRP

dBm

14.5

dBi

dB

59.5

dBm

Receiver
UE Antenna Gain

dBi

UE Cable Loss

dB

Thermal Noise

-174

UE Noise Figure

Total Thermal Noise (25 RB)

-100.5

Target SINR

-3.5
3

dBm/Hz
dB
dBm
dB

System Gain

163.5

dB

Noise Rise

dB

Path Loss

160.5

dB

Margin

400 MHz Uplink Link Budget

Transmitter
UE Tx Power (1 PA)

37

dBm

UE Antenna Gain

dBi

UE Cable Loss

dB

EIRP

37

dBm

Receiver
BS Antenna Gain

14.5

dBi

BS Cable Loss

dB

Thermal Noise

-174

BS Noise Figure

Total Thermal Noise (5RB)

-115.5

dBm/Hz
dB
dBm

SINR Target

-3.5

dB

System Gain

163

dB

Noise Rise

dB

Path Loss

160

dB

47

dBm

Margin

700 MHz Downlink Link Budget

Transmitter
BS Tx Power (2 PA)
BS Antenna Gain
BS Cable Loss
EIRP

17.7

dBi

dB

62.7

dBm

Receiver
UE Antenna Gain

dBi

UE Cable Loss

dB

Thermal Noise

-174

UE Noise Figure

Total Thermal Noise (25 RB)

-100.5

SINR Target
System Gain

dBm/Hz
dB
dBm

-3.5

dB

166.7

dB

dB

Margin
Noise Rise
4

Path Loss

163.7

dB

700 MHz Uplink Link Budget

Transmitter
UE Tx Power (1 PA)

37

dBm

UE Antenna Gain

dBi

UE Cable Loss

dB

EIRP

37

dBm

Receiver
BS Antenna Gain

17.7

dBi

BS Cable Loss

dB

Thermal Noise

-174

BS Noise Figure

Total Thermal Noise (5RB)

-115.5

SINR Target

dBm/Hz
dB
dBm

-3.5

dB

166.7

dB

Noise Rise

dB

Path Loss

163.7

dB

System Gain
Margin

Annex 2 proposes additional 700 MHz link budget for 31 and 27 dBm UE transmission power.

4 Discussion
Number of sites
The tables above illustrates that the path loss difference between 400 MHz and 700 MHz is in
the range of 3.5 dB (considering 5W user equipments) where as the attenuation difference is in
the range of 6 dB referring to Okumura-Hata model. It remains 2.5 dB in favor of 400 MHz.
As a consequence, the coverage of a given area is going to require 40% more sites at 700 MHz
than at 400 MHz considering that the propagation attenuation is following a d-3.5 rule.
Considering omnidirectional antenna which is making sense for rural roll-out, path losses are
similar and even in favor of 400 MHz as the current choice of omnidirectional antenna at 700
MHz is really limited. Under those assumptions (similar path losses), the coverage of a given
area will require 2.2 time more sites at 700 MHz than at 400 MHz.
If the UE transmission power is limited to 31 dBm in 700 MHz band (analogy with US Band14),
the difference between the two frequency bands is increasing from 2.5 dB to 8.5 dB, i.e.
requiring more than 3 time more sites at 700 MHz. Limitation to UE transmission power at the
level used into carrier networks (23 dBm) will lead to an even higher ratio (in the range of 9).

Handheld considerations
Concerning handhelds, their coverage will be much more limited due to their lower transmitted
power. One can expect only to have coverage in dense or very dense areas for handhelds.
It can be noticed that, in dense areas where the design is capacity driven, the limiting factor is
not noise but interference. Then there is, in this case, no real difference between 700 MHz and

400 MHz. It can be noted that even higher frequencies would also be acceptable for such
limited coverage.

5 Summary
As long as the network design is driven by coverage, the 400 MHz band is keeping the
advantage of a better propagation compared to the 700 MHz band. As a consequence the 400
MHz is clearly the best option to leverage existing sites and avoid costly additional site
constructions.
In this case the key element is clearly the transmitted power of the user equipment; under
realistic conditions (UE power limited to 31 dBm at 700 MHz), this would lead to 3 time more
sites with 700 MHz..
When the deployment is driven by capacity, i.e. in very dense areas, the frequency is not the
main determining factor.

Annex - 1
Determination of Handheld Terminals Antennas correlation
It is well-known that the correlation between antennas is expressed by the formula:
d

J 0 2. . ,

where d is the distance between the 2 antennas, is the wavelength, and J0 is the Bessel
function of the first kind and of zeroth order.
The following figure shows the value of the correlation as a function of the ratio

Correlation between two antennas

Correlation factor

Ratio of the distance between the antennas and the wavelength

In a Smartphone-like PPDR terminal, the maximum distance we can expect between 2 equal
gain antennas, in the best conditions, would be around 6 cm.
It can be observed that, at 450 MHz, the wavelength is 66.67 cm. This gives a ratio of the
distance between antennas and the wavelength of 9 %. The corresponding correlation factor ()
is 0.92.
At 750 MHz, the wavelength is 40 cm. This gives a ratio of the distance between antennas and
the wavelength of 15%. The corresponding correlation factor () is 0.82.
When two antennas are partially correlated (the fading that they receive are partially correlated),
they are equivalent to two antennas fully decorrelated but not having the same gain. The gain of
the equivalent (and decorrelated) antennas are respectively:

and 1

where the gain of the original antennas is supposed to be 0 dBi.

So, at 450 MHz, the two antennas are equivalent to two decorrelated antennas with respective
gains: 2.66 dB and -8.14 dB.
Similarly, at 750 MHz, the two antennas are equivalent to two decorrelated antennas with
respective gains: 2.23 dB and -4,84 dB.
The comparison of the space diversity effect created with the two antennas at 450 MHz and at
750 MHz is shown in the next figure. This figure shows the performance in term of Bit Error Rate
(BER), before channel decoding, in a single path Rayleigh fading propagation case.

Comparison performance 450 / 750 MHz antenna diversity in a smartphone over Rayleigh channel

10

Full decorrelation case

750 MHz
450 MHz
Full correlation case

-1

10

-2

BER before channel decoding

10

-3

10

-4

10

-5

10

-6

10

-7

10
-10

-5

10
SNR received on one antenna

15

20

25

30

It can be observed that, in the range of interest, i.e. for a BER before channel decoding between
1% and 10%, that at 750 MHz there is a relative gain compared to 450 MHz of 0.5 to 1 dB. After
channel decoding but also considering that LTE is using advanced repetition mechanism, the
relative gain is expected to be similar. Moreover this gain will impact the available throughput at
a given distance. This impact is expected to represent approximately 7% difference for the
throughput.

Annex - 2
Additional 700 MHz Downlink Link Budget
Transmitter
UE Tx Power (1 PA)

37

31

23

dBm

UE Antenna Gain

dBi

UE Cable Loss

dB

EIRP

37

31

23

dBm

Receiver
BS Antenna Gain

17.7

dBi

BS Cable Loss

dB

Thermal Noise

-174

BS Noise Figure

Thermal Noise (5RB)

dB

-115.5

SINR Target
System Gain

dBm/Hz
dBm

-3.5
166.7

160.7

dB
152.7

dB

Margin
Noise Rise
Path Loss

3
163.7

157.7

dB
149.7

dB