Method and arrangement relating to power consumption in a communications network

1. A method for controlling power consumption of a number of user equipments in a wireless communications network comprising a base station, the method comprising the steps of:

initially scheduling at least one user equipment (UE);

selecting a plurality of UEs scheduled for an uplink;

computing a maximum spectral efficiency-optimized bandwidth (BW SEopt ) and a corresponding data size (TBS SEopt ) for each selected UE;

computing a maximized data size for each selected UE, and

dividing any remaining bandwidth between the selected UEs in such a way that total power consumption is minimized.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein said at least one UE has power saving properties, and the method further comprises the step of:

using, for each power-saving UE, a most power-efficient modulation coding scheme supported by the base station, and limiting a total amount of data from the UE to said corresponding data size (TBS SEopt ).

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising assigning a minimum bandwidth resource to a number of UEs.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein each selected UE is guaranteed at least a minimum bandwidth resource.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of computing the maximum spectral efficiency-optimized bandwidth (BW SEopt ) and the corresponding data size (TBS SEopt ) for each selected UE comprises: (i) selecting a most efficient modulation coding scheme supported by the base station and (ii) calculating a maximum bandwidth resource size based on channel characteristics and user equipment power capability, based on an amount of data in the UE's transmit buffer, or based on the UE's maximum throughput capability.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of computing the maximized data size for each selected UE comprises comparing a sum of BW SEopt for all UEs to a total bandwidth resource.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the step of dividing any remaining bandwidth is made in such a way that all selected UEs use a most efficient modulation coding scheme supported by the base station.

8. An infrastructure arrangement for use in a communications network comprising:

at least one processing unit;

at least one memory unit; and

at least one communication interface, wherein

the arrangement is configured to

select one or more user equipments (UEs) scheduled for an uplink;

compute a maximum spectral efficiency-optimized bandwidth (BW SEopt ) and a corresponding data size (TBS SEopt ) for each selected UE;

compute a maximized data size for each selected UE; and

divide any remaining bandwidth between the UEs in such a way that total power consumption is minimized.

9. The infrastructure arrangement according to claim 8 , wherein at least one of the selected UEs has power saving properties, and the infrastructure is further configured to:

use, for each power-saving UE, a most power-efficient modulation coding scheme supported by the infrastructure arrangement, and

limit a total amount of data from the UE to said corresponding data size (TBS SEopt ).

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the computing the maximum spectral efficiency-optimized bandwidth (BW SEopt ) for each selected UE is based on using a most spectrally efficient modulation coding scheme for the UE, based on channel characteristics, and based on power capability of the UE.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein the computing the maximized data size comprises increasing, in response to a determination that a sum of BW SEopt of all of the selected UEs is less than a total bandwidth resource, allocation of bandwidth resource to each of the selected UEs having an amount of transmission data that exceeds TBS SEopt , and wherein the remaining bandwidth comprises bandwidth of the total bandwidth resource that is left after the increased allocation of bandwidth resource.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the dividing any remaining bandwidth between the selected UEs comprises selecting, for each of the selected UEs, a modulation coding scheme that is less spectrally efficient than the most spectrally efficient modulation coding scheme.