Analysis of A New Proposal For Wimax Installation Sites For Maximum Safety and Minimum Hazardous Radiation On The Population of Sana'A City

IPASJ International Journal of Electronics & Communication (IIJEC)
Web Site: http://www.ipasj.org/IIJEC/IIJEC.htm

Email: [email protected]
ISSN 2321-5984
A Publisher for Research Motivation........
Volume 3, Issue 2, February 2015
Analysis of a new proposal for WiMax

installation sites for maximum safety and
minimum hazardous radiation on the
population of Sana'a City
Naif Alsharabi1, Saeed Aldoba'i2, Farouq Alfohidi3, Adel Alshemiri1,Malek Algabery2
1
Amran University
Sana'a University
3
Ibb University
ABSTRACT
The Yemeni Ministry of Communications launched the WiMax service in YEMEN. The launch was made with lack of
attention paid to the effects of radiation on the environment and human health. Although the service is important to
beneficiaries as it provides them with high-speed data transfer, it represents a threat to others, especially near the places of
installation of base stations for the service. For this reason, it is considered necessary to undertake a study on safe places to
put these stations, especially in cities and densely populated places including markets, schools and residential buildings, in
order to avoid the risk of electromagnetic radiation of high-energy output of the radio broadcast of the towers on the
surrounding area. This research studies the demography, population distribution and future growth of SANA'A city and offers
proposed solutions for safer places to install Towers WiMax which would have less effect on the environment and human
health in order to reduce the potential negative effects of high-frequency radio radiation on humans over time.
Keywords WiMax; Radiation effect; Radio Network planning; Human Health
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1Background Review
Radio waves are low energy electromagnetic waves. This energy is moved through space via towers sending and
receiving signals using electromagnetic waves. Electromagnetic waves are emitted from natural and synthetic sources
and play an important role in our daily lives. We feel warm as a result of electromagnetic waves emitted by the sun and
we can see by using part of the electromagnetic spectrum (called the visible spectrum), which our eyes can receive. The
generation of electromagnetic waves is the inevitable result of each device in which there is an electric current, even in
the nerve cells in the human body. This requires us to give attention to a special study to determine the impact and the
resulting overlap of radiation from mobile towers with the electric current generated by nerve cells in the human body.
All electromagnetic radiation consists of volatile electric and magnetic fields. This vibrational frequency, which is the
number of times each second a wave fluctuates, determines the properties of this wave and its potential application.
This paper addresses the WiMax planning and coverage for Sana'a city, where WiMax provides two forms of wireless
service. The first is a non-line-of-sight, WiFi style of service, where a small antenna on your computer connects to the
tower. In this mode, WiMax uses a lower frequency range 2 GHz to 11 GHz (similar to WiFi). Lower-wavelength
transmissions are not as easily disrupted by physical obstructions they are better able to diffract, or bend, around
obstacles. The second is line-of-sight service, where a fixed dish antenna points straight at the WiMax tower from a
rooftop or pole. The line-of-sight connection is stronger and more stable, so it's able to send a lot of data with fewer
errors. Line-of-sight transmissions use higher frequencies, with ranges reaching a possible 66 GHz. At higher
frequencies, there is less interference and lots more bandwidth.[1][2][4].
This paper addresses the radio access network requirements for a new deployment of WiMax in the metropolitan area
of Sana'a city based on the IEEE 802.16e air interface standards. The most important technical and business goal of
radio access network is efficiently providing coverage and capacity, while avoiding the communications radiation
(RF/microwave) spectrum effect on human health. This paper will focus on the places of WiMax sites are far enough
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from the population density providing highly coverage and capacity.

1.2Research difficulty
It is not possible to find the medical data record for patients who have been effected by the radiation beam in the local
hospitals for two reasons. The first is, that hospitals in Yemen are not like those in developed countries; they do not
have the modern equipment and advanced testing required to make a proper diagnosis, furthermore the WiMax services
just lunched a few months ago in the area under research. The second reason is the difficulty in obtaining local
volunteers on whom to conduct research experiments as this would require exposing them to radio radiation for an
appropriate period and subjecting them to a medical examination to determine medical effects on their health as a
result of exposure to such radiation.
1.3Research objectives
The goal of this research is to urge the competent authorities to work harder before the implementation of any project to
pay attention to human health and environmental studies and to do extensive work to evaluate the potential negative
effects of the implementation of the projects on the community prior to their implementation. The second objective is to
define a way for these parties to review places for the installation of broadcast stations for electromagnetic city of
Sana'a, which would also benefit the other cities in the next phase.
The paper organization is as follows:
Related works are explained in section 2, the detailed radio network planning is described in section 3; the simulation
results for radio network planning are presented in Section 4; finally, the conclusions are highlighted in Section 5.
2. RELATED WORK
The Danger of WiMax which is sprint new 4g signal. WiMax is Interoperability for Microwave Access. This signal
offers broadband access in areas where it wasnt previously available. This signal offers broadband access to the
internet day or night as well as increasing bandwidth to cell phones and data transmissions power. This increases
electromagnetic radiation and exposure to radiation which can cause health issues. You will come in contact with these
signals in your normal life even if you dont own these products.
Due to the newness of WiMax, the dangers are not really known and the effects may not be known for thirty to forty
years. This signal may be dangerous because it will be present in schools, homes, towns, offices and businesses. Some
concerns are that prolonged exposure to this radiation will increase incidences of cancer, brain tumors, and
neurological problems.
Children are especially affected by electromagnetic radiation due to the fact that they are still growing and memory
problems, headaches and sleep disorders as well as growth problems may be caused by this exposure The radiation that
is released is much like a microwave oven, one WiMax tower can cover 25 square miles [3-6].
For the past five decades, studies have confirmed that non-ionizing communications radiation in the RF/microwave
spectrum has the same effect on human health as ionizing gamma wave radiation from nuclear reactions. Leading
German radiation expert Dr. Heyo Eckel, an official of the German Medical Association, states, The injuries that
result from radioactive radiation are identical with the effects of electromagnetic radiation. The damages are so similar
that they are hard to differentiate. [7].
The identical damage resulting from both radioactive gamma waves and high frequency microwaves involves a
pathological condition in which the nuclei of irradiated human cells splinter into fragments called micronuclei.
Micronuclei are a definitive pre-cursor of cancer. During the 1986 nuclear reactor disaster at Chernobyl in Russia, the
ionizing radiation released was equivalent to 400 atomic bombs, with an estimated ultimate human toll of 10,000
deaths. Exposed Russians quickly developed blood cell micronuclei, leaving them at high risk for cancer.
RF/microwaves from cell phones and cell tower transmitters also cause micronuclei damage in blood cells. This was
reported a decade ago by Dr. Henry Lai and Narendrah Singh, biomedical researchers at the University of Washington
in Seattle.
Dr. Singh is famous for refining comet assay techniques used to identify DNA damage. Lai and Singh demonstrated in
numerous animal studies that mobile phone radiation quickly causes DNA single and double strand breaks at levels
well below the current federal safe exposure standards[8].
The telecommunications industry knows this thanks to its own six-year, wireless technology research (WTR) study
program mandated by Congress and completed in 1999. Gathering a team of over 200 doctors, scientists and experts in
the field, WTR research showed that human blood exposed to cell phone radiation had a 300-percent increase in
genetic damage in the form of micronuclei. Dr. George Carlo, a public health expert who coordinated the WTR
studies, confirms that exposure to communications radiation from wireless technology is potentially the biggest health
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insult this nation has ever seen. Dr. Carlo believes RF/microwave radiation is a greater threat than cigarette smoking
and asbestos[9].
In 2000, European communications giant T-Mobile commissioned the German ECOLOG Institute to review all
available scientific evidence in regard to health risks for wireless telecommunications[6]. ECOLOG found over 220
peer-reviewed, published papers documenting the cancer-initiating and cancer-promoting effects of the high frequency
radiation Employed by wireless technology[10]. Because gamma waves and RF/microwave radiation are identically
carcinogenic and genotoxic to the cellular roots of life, the safe dose of either kind of radiation is zero. No study has
proven that any level of exposure from cell-damaging radiation is safe for humans. Dr. Carlo confirms that cell damage
is not dose dependant because any exposure level, no matter how small, can trigger damage response by cell
phones[11].
3. DEMOGRAPHIC SURVEY OF WORK AREA

In order to submit a proposal to represent WiMax network to be safe from the study of the natural geographic and
population density of the area and locate the installation of the towers so that they are far from the direct influence of
humans and meet the needs of the ideal coverage.
3.1. Natural geographical
The area of the capital is about 390 square kilometers spread over ten districts, according to the administrative division
for the year 2004. [12]. The demographic nature of the capital Sana'a, according to the administrative division [13] is
divided into ten administrative regions, as is shown in Fig.1.
Figure1 : The Sana'a capital district

Surrounded by several mountains from all sides and containing medium heights and hills within the city, as illustrated
by Fig.2. In some of these districts there are no residents (e.g. Bani Alharth) and, also, in some districts the number of
potential users is not significantly high ( e.g. Maeen). While the area of Old-Sana'a city and Altahrir are smaller, more
crowded areas (Table1).
3.2. Population
Table 1 shows the total population of Sana'a city is approximately 1.6 million according to the results of the census for
the year 2004, and its distributed population and housing and families at the district level. According to this, the area's
most densely populated and urban are from 1 to 8, so our focus will be in the distribution of the service on these areas
and the exclusion of some villages in the area (such as bani Al Harith) where areas are uninhabited and non-urban.
The estimated number of target subscribers in first few years for a new operator can be about 1%, This percentage
compared to the number of subscribers to ADSL service in our previous study[14].
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TABLE: Subscribers are expected to different regions

Discrete name
Area Km2
Total/ Population
Subscriber 1%
old Sana'a
Shoab
Azal
Alsafiya
Alsabeen
Alwahda
Altahreer
Maeen
Althowra
Bani Alharth
Total
1.8
15
14.7
10.4
31
7.6
2.8
11.4
21.6
269
385.3
63398
213939
115054
109109
311203
99596
66898
265469
170145
184509
1599320
634
2139
1151
1091
3112
996
669
2655
1701
1845
1599
The focus of this study is not the number of subscribers in terms of the quality of service provided to them where WiMax broadband has a large number of beneficiaries of vast areas. Instead, our focus here is to choose places for the
installation of Wi-Max towers far enough away so as to limit the direct radiation impact on the health of residents
living nearby the towers. For this reason, the following section proposes the appropriate solutions for the optimum
planning for the distribution of the towers in locations far from population density, service centers and public facilities
such as schools, markets and homes.
Figure 2 Boundaries of the capital city and sites
4. IMPLEMENTATION SCENARIOS AND SIMULATIONS

4.1. overview
WiMax cannot deliver 70 Mbit/s over 50 km (31 mi). Like all wireless technologies, WiMax can operate at higher
bitrates or over longer distances but not both. Operating at the maximum range of 50 km (31 mi) increases bit error
rate and thus results in a much lower bitrates. Conversely, reducing the range (to under 1 km) allows a device to
operate at higher bitrates[15]. Like all wireless systems, available bandwidth is shared between users in a given radio
sector, so performance could deteriorate in the case of many active users in a single sector. However, with adequate
capacity planning and the use of WiMax's Quality of Service, a minimum guaranteed throughput for each subscriber
can be put in place. In practice, most users will have a range of 4-8 Mbit/s services and additional radio cards will be
added to the base station to increase the number of users that may be served as required[16].This is able to reduce the
coverage area for the benefit of the quality or vice versa. In our case, the city to be covered is a small area and hence the
property of reducing the coverage area will greatly benefit because we will cut back the ability of broadcast towers and
increase the safety for nearby residents of those towers. The demographic information mentioned in section tree of this
research indicates that it can cover the target area with six broadcast stations (BS) in accordance with the
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characteristics of the area coverage provided by WiMax tower (Fig. 3), each tower (site) broadcast of 2.3 GHz signal to
cover a radius of 4 kilometers with cell capacity of 10MHz bandwidth is about 15Mbps. The assumed throughput per
user is 512 kbps. The cell such that supports 15Mbps/512=30 active subscriber simultaneously, for overbooking factor
20, the total simultaneous subscribers under BS(3 cells) =3*30*20=1800 subscribers. This subscriber of one BS is more
than the expected of subscribers previously proposed in Table 1 for whole area of Sana'a city.
Table 2: Radiation around the Wi-Max tower.
Distance R(m)
T. P. Watts(Pt)
Antt. T. gain
dB(Gt)
Power density Pd in
W.M2
1
5
10
50
100
200
300
400
500
1000
65
65
65
65
65
65
65
65
65
65
18
18
18
18
18
18
18
18
18
18
93.15
3.72
0.93
0.0372
0.0093
0.00232
0.00103
0.000582
0.00037
9.31529E-05
Power density Pd at a distance R is given by Pd=(PtxGt/4 R2) watt/m2; where:

Pt=Transmitter power in Watts ,
Gt=Gain of transmitter antenna
R= Distance from the antenna in meter.
4.2. The proposed places

The proposed locations of WiMax towers installation must be include the following rules:
1. Not to be in residential areas.
2. Far away from primary schools and markets.
3. Less distance between transmission tower and the nearest habitation at least 200 meters (the simulation shows the
power between -35 to -55 dBm in the same distance).
4. To be in high places in order to verify connectivity of line of site for microwaves connection.
Figure 3 Proposed sites tower
Figure 4 Sites tower coverage
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Fig. 3 shows the six proposed locations for installation of the broadcast stations (sites) according to the previous
mentioned rules. The station can cover a distance of 3-4 kilometers in all directions where there is a likelihood of
overlap in coverage areas.
This overlap does not affect communication, where it is assigned a different frequency to a different station and the
beneficiary of the service associated with the strongest signal in the coverage area, regardless of the nearest station.
Coverage in-drawn map (Fig. 4) represent cover theory to explain the sites towers broadcast and distributed according
to the terms described above. Through this distribution, we find that the towers covering most areas and neighborhoods
within the capital in terms of the availability of the service, and the least danger for the residents of areas nearby the
radiation broadcasted by those towers. It is noted that the highest unwanted radiation power (danger radiations)
outgoing from the tower up to distance of 100 meters as notes from Table 1 and Table 2.
Fig. 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 are show that the nearest residence to a broadcast towers is no less than half a kilometer at
the moment, taking into account that the population increase after twenty years will reduce this distance to between
200 to 300 meters at the very least. This leads us to believe that the geographical nature of these locations is key to
ensuring that there will still be a distance of between 200 to 300 around those six sites (location) which is unpopulated
over time. Some of these geographical locations are rough mountains and the rest are security places which prevents
the establishment of any public housing around them, as it will be seen later.
Table 3: Sites location names and positions
NAME
LATITUDE
LONGITUDE
SITE1
SITE 2
SITE 3
SITE 4
SITE 5
SITE 6
15.382595
15.290399
15.346396
15.336623
15.296974
15.243722
44.179894
44.206238
44.230604
44.164867
44.215509
44.236586
AREA NATURE
1ST
BAND IRONCLAD
CAMP
CAMP
CAMP
CAMP
CAMP
Table 3 contains the latitude and longitude of each proposed site, number of sectors in each location, angle of coverage
and the name of place. Table 5 contains the whole details attached end of the research.
The first place (site) shown in Fig. 5 is a park of "March 21" is a vast area and population-free at the moment and the
nearest habitation is far away at least 0.6 km from the site tower. Assuming the possible existence of a residential
development or service with the passage of time in the vicinity of the proposed site tower, this study has seriously
evaluated the risk and placed a safe distance to the nearest tower at least 200 m from new developing area.
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The second and fifth sites are a "ALNADEEN" north and south mountain shown respectively in Fig. 6 and 7, are
surrounded by a large area empty and free within reason of the nature of the security zone.
The third site is a "NOQOM" mountain, "guard installations" a military site with an empty space and housing far from
a distance of not less than half a km.(Fig. 8).Fig.9 is a "ASER" mountain, was selected for the fourth site, it's a high
place overlooking a vast area of the city and nearby areas, most of it uninhabited areas with nearest residence not less
than 0.6 Km. away.
While the last site was chosen is "Alaswad", overlooking to a wide uninhabited area as is shown in Fig. 10 and the
possibility of increasing the rate of future population growth considered to be very low, and where the site is located
within the security zone. In conclusion, the six proposed sites are secure sites far from the densely populated housing
and service facilities such as civil markets and schools.
4.3.Simulation results
The simulation results from the radio planning for implanted for Sana'a city using ASSET 8.0, AIRCOM
INTERNATIONAL Ltd. are presented in this section. Covering different signal levels, ranging from high power in a
very close distance from the transmission WiMax tower and down to the very low power at long distances from the
WiMAX tower as presented in table 4.
Table 4: Signal Strength Colors and Coverage area
COLOR
SIGNAL STRENGTH IN
DB M
-35 TO -64
-65 TO -74
-75 TO -84
-85 TO -100
DISTANCE COVERAGE AROUND

TOWER
MIN.
MAX
1M
300 M
2 KM
3KM
300 M.
3.5 KM
4 KM
4 KM
Table 4 showed four different colors was assigned to different signals to clarify the coverage area of the different levels
signal strength transmitted from Wi-Max towers, the signal strength decreases when a distance increases from the
tower, this will be very clear in the Google map describing later in this section. Simulations considered the amount of
radiation transmitted from a six sites proposed in previous section, and the coverage area of each signal level of these
sites location already described in Figures 4 to 10. Blue color refers to the strength of the received signal (-35-64 dBm)
pattens to Gogol map shown in Fig.11, it's very clear that the area covered by this signal is a very small area around the
sites, this blue area is very satisfactory safety area proposed in this study, where it's free zones of the population.
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Where the simulation result demonstrated of color Chartreuse was signal level power distribution around BSs for -65 to
-75 are shown in Fig.12., covering a wide area of the city, most of the coverage area of this signal is populated and
crowded, including the most public services and populations. Some are non-populated and far from overpopulation and
service facilities such as schools, markets and houses as noted in Fig.12.
This signal is considered fairly safe and most mobile phone telecommunications companies broadcast this strength in
most parts of the world.
The remaining signal level demonstrated in color Orange and Orange red shown in Fig. 13 and Fig.14 respectively are
very low signal power from (-76 to -100), is safer. It covers the remaining area, which is densely populated and
includes some public services.
The Signal Level over the whole Sana'a city is demonstrated in Fig.15. It may be noted that almost 90% of the whole
city has satisfactory coverage while subscribers are not available everywhere with a both very good signal level
achieving of good quality coverage and human safety. Three signal strength levels are posted in this figure with
different colors, each color refers to the range of transmitted power in decibel as shown in table 4. Notes that the signal
strength ranging between -65dB to -75dB covers 90% of the coverage area. Where this range of signals power are
achieving more safe and good quality of services.
Figure 16 illustrates the use of five levels of signal instead of the four levels are shown in Table 4 color blue to denote
the signal level between -35 to -43, light brown color to denote the signal level between -44 to -64, while the rest
remained the same signal levels what is in table 4 without change.
This update does not change the signal levels to the current coverage map mentioned in the past, but gives a
confirmation of the validity of the selected sites and it is in the safe limits for radiation risk to nearby residents of those
towers at the moment. This division has importance in the future as it gives us the index as a result of increasing the
percentage of the population should not exceed the dangerous distance that is covering by blue color in the range of 100
to 150 meters around those towers. This proves the validity of this study in the selection of those six sites. They are
really safe sites in term of the radiation risk to nearby residents. The competent authorities should not allow the future
construction of houses to exceed the distance dangerous for their own safety.
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5.CONCLUSION
A new WiMax tower radio network planning in Sana'a capital city of YEMEN republic has been performed with six
sites covering whole city's densely populated (urban). Granting considerable attention to human health during
deployment, those tower's locations, where the percentage of the negative impact of the strength of the high radiation
that has a direct impact to residents who nearby the radiation towers, is completely non-existent. In addition, it
provides high quality of service to subscribers within the city with the ability to increase service in line with the
population increase in the future. The simulation results show that satisfactory performance has been achieved in terms
of coverage and human safety.
REFERENCES
[1]
[2]
[3]
[4]
Carl Weinschenk. " Speeding Up WiMax". IT Business Edge, Retrieved August 31, 2011.
http://computer.howstuffworks.com/wimax1.htm
http://babasnews.wordpress.com/2010/07/24/the-danger-of-wimax
Roger Marks "IEEE 802.16 WirelessMAN Standard: Myths and Facts". Presentation at 2006 Wireless
Communications Conference, June 29, 2006.
[5] 2.45 GHz radiofrequency fields alter gene expression in cultured human cells," Lee S. et al, Department of
Medicine, University of Chicago, PubMed 16107253.
[6] "WiMax Forum - Technology". Retrieved 2008-07-22.
[7] Interview with Dr. Eckel was published by Schwabischen. Find this interview at www.heseproject.org. See "The
Cell Nucleus is Mutating, 12-07-06.
[8] Dr. Lai "Neurological Effects of Radiofrequency Electromagnetic Radiation," a paper presented to the Mobile
Phones and Health Symposium, , University of Vienna, October 25-28-1998. Also "DNA Damage and Cell Phone
Radiation," www.rfsafe.com, 11-02-05.
[9] Dr. George Carlo and Martin Schram, Carroll & Graf "Cell Phones: Invisible Hazards in the Wireless Age",
p.151,2001.
[10] Summary of the ECOLOG study for " T-MobileMobile Telecommunications and Health", Find this summary at
www.hese-project.org, 2000.
[11] Dr. George Carlo"Health Social Services and Housing Sub-Panel Telephone Mast Review," Find this excellent
dissertation at www. safewireless.org, 2-2620-07.
[12] Central statistical organization "The final results of the General Census of Population, Housing and
Establishments", www.cso-yemen.org, 2004.
[13] National Information Center Outline of the Secretariat of the capital. April 6, 2011.
[14] Naif alsharabi " Information technology and the local community: Obstacles and solutions", the international
conference of IT. (Ecof3),Bahrain, April- 2010.
[15] Ansh Agarwal and etc. " 4G, the fourth generation of mobile Communication" , IJECS Volume 2 Issue 4 Page No.
1012-1017,April, 2013.
[16] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WiMax
Authors Biographies
Naif Abdo Nasr Alsharabi was born on December 28, 1974 in Yemen. He is currently a assistance
professor at Amran university. He is interested in in mobile ad-hoc network, wireless network, sensor
network, and is currently researching GSM,CDMA, Wimax, LTE and cellular networking.
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IPASJ International Journal of Electronics & Communication (IIJEC)

Web Site: http://www.ipasj.org/IIJEC/IIJEC.htm

A Publisher for Research Motivation........

Volume 3, Issue 2, February 2015