80% of Energy Use from 20% of Sites? Yes. Pareto is at Work

Pareto distributions seem to apply to mobile network energy consumption. That should not come as a surprise. Pareto distributions--where 80 percent of the outcomes are produced by 20 percent of the actions-- are widely seen in human life, business and even nature. 

“We’ve seen 20 percent of traffic consuming 80 percent of the power across wide footprints of the network where voice and data traffic has, and will continue to remain low,” says Mats Pellback Scharp, Ericsson head of sustainability. 

Typically,  80 percent of any company’s profit is generated by 20 percent of its customers; 80 percent of complaints come from 20 percent of customers; 80 percent of profits come from 20 percent of the company’s effort; 80 percent of sales come from 20 percent of products or services; 80 percent of sales are made by 20 percent of sellers and 80 percent of clients come from 20 percent of marketing activities.

There are many other common Pareto examples:

• 80 percent of car accidents are caused by 20 percent of young people

• 80 percent of lottery tickets are bought by 20 percent of society

• 80 percent of air pollution is caused by 20 percent of the population

• 80 percent of all firearms are used by 20 percent of the population

• 80 percent of all Internet traffic belongs to 20 percent of websites

• 80 percent of car crashes happen within the first 20 percent of the distance covered

• 80 percent of mobile phone calls come from 20 percent of the population

• 80 percent of the time people use 20 percent of the tools at their disposal

That is largely an artifact of geography and density. Most of a mobile network's traffic is carried by 20 percent of cell sites. 

Studies conducted by Amdocs have suggested that 20 percent of mobile network locations support about 80 percent of network data demand. 

source: Amdocs

And, of course, if usage is related to revenue, then as much as half of mobile revenue is generated from perhaps 10 percent of cell sites. Possibly 30 percent of total cell sites produce 80 percent of total revenue. 

source: techeconomy blog

The 80/20 distribution of energy consumption is largely determined by the need to power 70 percent of the network cell sites to handle just about 20 percent of the traffic. Low usage means high wasted energy assets.