Markdown Version | Session Recording

Session Date/Time: 07 Nov 2023 10:45

eimpact

Summary

The eimpact session covered a range of topics related to sustainability and environmental impact in networking. The main presentation focused on green metrics, data models, and simplification strategies for telemetry. Subsequent presentations included an overview of sustainability standardization efforts in various Standards Development Organizations (SDOs), infrastructure sharing, APIs for path energy consumption, and frameworks for telemetry data collection and aggregation. The session also included discussions on broader environmental impacts beyond carbon emissions.

Key Discussion Points

• Green Metrics and Data Modeling:
  • Importance of data for managing and optimizing network sustainability.
  • Defining relevant metrics at the physical, traffic, and network levels.
  • Challenges in translating energy consumption to greenhouse gas emissions.
  • Consideration of factors influencing measurement accuracy (location, power factor, lifetime of devices).
  • Data models for energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.
  • Proposed augmentation of the powerwave data model.
• Sustainability Standardization Efforts in Different STOs:
  • Overview of sustainability standardization efforts in ITU, ETSI, and 3GPP.
  • ITU-T Study Group 5 recommendations on life cycle assessments (L.1410) and handprint methodology (L.1480).
  • ETSI's work on environmental engineering and network energy efficiency.
  • 3GPP's focus on mobile network metrics and solutions for reducing environmental impact.
• Infrastructure Sharing for Sustainability:
  • Potential of infrastructure sharing to reduce investment bottlenecks and connect the unconnected.
  • Considerations regarding resilience, performance, and trust in shared infrastructure.
  • Questions about the implementation of infrastructure sharing in different network domains (access, transport, core).
• API for Path Energy Consumption:
  • Definition of an API for retrieving energy consumption associated with a network path.
  • Consideration of baseline energy consumption (independent of traffic) and traffic-dependent energy consumption.
  • Rationale for exposing energy consumption information to customers and using it for network optimization.
• Framework for Telemetry Data Collection and Aggregation:
  • Principles for collecting and aggregating telemetry data for power and sustainability.
  • Leveraging existing interfaces and adding metadata at the collection software level.
  • Use of YANG to describe data.
  • Mapping from YANG models to time-series databases.
  • Transparency in data tracking.
  • Need for agreeing on what to measure and how to measure it.
  • Involving economics experts in discussions about idle power responsibility.
• Broader Environmental Impacts Beyond Carbon:
  • Consideration of impacts beyond energy consumption and carbon emissions, including mineral extraction, land use, water use, and waste generation.
  • Finite amount of land.
  • Finite amount of water for cooling, for mineral extraction processes
  • Electromagnetic spectrum as being a finite resource, that has to be allocated.
  • Waste generation pollution from fossil fuels, burning of e waste.

Decisions and Action Items

• Explore further development of data models: Continue to augment data models for energy consumption.
• Address metrics standardization: Colin to lead further investigation of metrics ready for standardization and coordination across IETF groups.
• Continue Discussion on Mailing List: Encourage ongoing discussion on the mailing list, especially on topics raised during the lightning talks.
• Internet Draft on Entities: Mallory Notle to publish draft on defining the entity under test for measurements.
• Publish Framework Summary: Jan to summarize framework for data collection and aggregation on the mailing list.
• Share ISO information: Ronald to share pointers to work in ISO related to SDG integration into standards.

Next Steps

• Continue discussions on the mailing list to address open questions and challenges related to green metrics, data models, and standardization efforts.
• Coordinate with other IETF working groups to avoid duplication of effort and ensure consistent application of sustainability metrics and data models.
• Explore potential collaborations with other organizations (e.g., ITU, ETSI, 3GPP) to align sustainability standardization efforts and share best practices.
• Develop concrete use cases and scenarios to guide the selection and application of metrics for evaluating network sustainability.