Ray Tracing Tools Assessment for the Evaluation of EMF Levels Generated by 5G NR Systems: An Overview

Planning fifth generation (5G) networks is expected to be very challenging due to the main innovations introduced by new generation systems. In fact, the use of millimeter wave spectrum, massive MIMO, beamforming and beam steering techniques certainly lead to different propagations scenarios, in which the surrounding environment can have a significant impact on electric field levels generated by 5G antennas and thus on radio coverage. Moreover, the frequencies involved completely change the interaction between millimeter waves and human tissue, due to the different depth of penetration. All these aspects have generated several questions from both operators and population such as: how many antennas have to be installed to ensure good coverage of the signal or how 5G technologies can affect human exposure to electromagnetic fields (EMF). Ray tracing tools seems to be a very promising solution in the design of 5G networks, giving at the same time a prediction of both levels of coverage and human exposure, with a good accuracy. However, before using them in 5G scenarios, an assessment of their results is necessary. In this work we present a systematic approach for the assessment of ray tracing tools. Two proprietary tools have been tested on different scenarios and their reliability has been proved on both FR1 and FR2 5G band. The proposed method can be very useful to assess other tools based on ray tracing technique, without the need of onsite measurements of the signal, that can be very difficult for 5G systems.