Energy-Aware Control of Home Networks

Home networks have become heterogeneous environment hosting a variety of wireless and wired telecommunication technologies. Currently there no exist any intelligent energy saving mechanism to control the home networks. In this paper we propose an energy-aware strategy that integrate Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) with a convergent digital home network. We aim to demonstrate that a WSN can act as a dependable control plane to manage the high speed home network. While the home network nodes can be deactivated, the WSN is always on and, due to the low data rate required to properly work, it consumes a very limited quantity of energy. This mutual interaction leads to a substantial reduction of the energy consumptions. Simulation results show that this strategy is effective in different scenarios and provides a tangible economic benefit.