Feasibility study of an app-based high-frequency measurement network for estimating the exposure of the population to electromagnetic fields of mobile communications

What is the issue?

Exposure monitoring of high-frequency electromagnetic fields should clarify to what extent new technological developments contribute to a change or possible increase in individual exposure. In order to assess temporal and spatial variations with a resolution sufficient for reliable exposure data, repeated measurements at many points on a regular basis are necessary.

The implementation of an area-wide and continuous monitoring is not possible because of the effort associated with conventional methods. For the mobile communications sector, a crowdsourcing-based approach that relies on the collection of measurement data using standard smart phones could be a possible solution.

What is the current situation?

The propagation of electromagnetic waves is influenced by numerous factors. Because of radiation characteristics of an antenna and physical phenomena such as reflection, diffraction, and attenuation as well as the superposition with contributions from other transmitters, the field distribution in the vicinity of transmitters is subject to small-scale variations. In addition, the field distributions are subject to temporal fluctuations because the transmission power can change depending on the load and because the environment is not static.

If these field distributions are to be recorded with sufficient spatial and temporal resolution, a close-meshed and continuously operating measurement network is necessary.

What are the objectives of the BfS research project?

The aim is to investigate the technical and economic feasibility of the smart phone and crowdsourcing-based approach for a measurement network. Specifically, it should be clarified whether the signal strength indicators measured by many terminals can give a representative picture of exposure over the entire mobile communication spectrum used.