BeGREEN Intelligent Plane for AI-driven Energy Efficient O-RAN management

Abstract: Cellular networks are undergoing a revolutionary transform with the advent of O-RAN architectures and AI/ML solutions. O-RAN's Non-Real-Time and Near-Real Time RAN Intelligent Controllers open the door to the implementation of automated control-loops that can provide RAN optimisations in numerous scenarios and use cases, and which can be further empowered by AI-driven approaches. Energetic sustainability has raised as one of the main optimisations targets due to the impact of mobile networks on global energy consumption. To this end, the BeGREEN project aims at enhancing the energy efficiency of beyond 5G networks by defining novel AI/ML-based methods at RAN and edge infrastructure. This paper presents BeGREEN Intelligent Plane, a novel framework which implements and exposes AI/ML workflows to O-RAN-based optimisations targeting energy efficiency. We also describe an exemplary application of the Intelligent Plane and its AI Engine, which aims at providing AI-driven cell on/off control.