Using energy criteria to admit flows in a wired network

Abstract

Admission control in wired networks has been traditionally used as a way to control traffic congestion and guarantee quality of service. Here, we propose an admission control mechanism which aims to keep the power consumption at the lowest possible level by restricting the more energy-demanding users. This work relies on the fact that power consumption of networking devices, and of the network as a whole, is not proportional to the carried traffic, as would be the ideal case [1]. As a result some operating regions may be more efficient than others and "jumps" may arise in power consumption when new traffic is added in the network. The proposed mechanism aims to keep power consumption in the lowest possible power consumption level, hopping to the next level only when necessary. © 2013 Springer-Verlag London.