Selection and Adjustment of Propagation Models to

Compute the Electric Field Strength for Exposure

Assessment Purposes in Urban Environment
Marlon Patiño. Alejandro Rangel R. Juan V. Balbastre-Tejedor Daniela Alfonso C.
EMC-UN Group, Electrical EMC-UN Group, Electrical ITACA Research Institute EMC-UN Group, Electrical
Engineering Department Engineering Department Universitat Politècnica de Engineering Department
Universidad Nacional de Universidad Nacional de València Universidad Nacional de
Colombia, Colombia, Valencia, Spain Colombia,
Bogotá, Colombia Bogotá, Colombia Email :jbalbast@itaca.upv.es Bogotá, Colombia
Email: marlon@ieee.org Email: jarangelr@unal.edu.co Email: dalfonsoc@unal.edu.co

Zulma Y. López Felix Vega. John J. Pantoja .

EMC-UN Group, Electrical
Engineering Department
Universidad Nacional de
Colombia,
Bogotá, Colombia
Email: zylopezr@unal.edu.co
EMC-UN Group, Electrical
Engineering Department
Universidad Nacional de
Colombia,
Bogotá, Colombia
Email: jfvegas@unal.edu.co
Email:jjpantojaa@unal.edu.co
EMC-UN Group, Electrical _.
Engineering Department
EMC-UN Group, Electrical
Universidad Nacional de
Engineering Department
Colombia,
Universidad Nacional de
Bogotá, Colombia
Colombia, Bogotá, Colombia
Email: ___@unal.edu.co

Abstract—This work deals with the selection of the best suited
propagation models for computing electric field strength for
exposure level assessment in urban environments in Colombia.
The selection is based on the comparison of numerical results
obtained using a well known commercial tool and measurements
performed in the bands assigned in Colombia to the Digital
Television Broadcasting (470 MHz-698 MHz) and Digital Radio
Trunking (806 MHz-898 MHz).
Keywords—propagation model, electric field, exposure level.
I. INTRODUCTION
In the last decades, several International Standards
discussing maximum exposure levels to electromagnetic fields
have been published [1][2]. The aim of those standards has been
not only to preserve human health from the effects of non-
ionizing radiations but also to deal with the widespread fears
about them (which in many countries resulted in slow network
deployments).
National Authorities have issued mandatory regulations in
many countries limiting the exposure levels based on
International Standards. In Colombia, the Agencia Nacional del
Espectro (ANE) is the Administration Body in charge of issuing
authorizations to operate new radio transmitters or to modify
the radiation characteristics of those already deployed. To help
its technical staff to perform the studies needed to a priori
assess the compliance with the regulatory exposure limits, the
ANE issued a contract to the Universidad Nacional (UNAL) de
Colombia to develop a web-based tool to predict the exposure
level changes due to new or significantly modified radio
transmitters. This paper describes part of the work carried out
by UNAL team to get that goal.
In order to assess the effect of a new or modified transmitter
in a given environment the first step is to know the exposure
level due to other transmitters in that place and then to predict
its value after the new or modified one is turned on.
There are a lot of propagation models that have been used to
predict the power density distribution produce by a set of
transmitters for network planning [3]. Some of them have also
been used to predict electric field levels within the frame of
epidemiological studies on European Countries [4], but, as far
as authors know not such a study has been carried out in
tropical or subtropical regions. The work described in this paper
is focused on selecting and adjusting well known propagation
models to obtain electric field strength values accurate enough
to predict the modification of exposure levels for regulatory
purposes in Colombia.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows: section II
describes the numerical tool and the propagation models
considered in this work; section III describes the experimental
procedure used to measure the electromagnetic field values; the
results of the comparison between simulations and
measurements are presented and discussed in section IV,
whereas the conclusions of the work are highlighted in section
V.
II. THE NUMERICAL MODEL
As far as the results of the numerical computations will be
the basis of regulatory actions, the authors decided to use a well
known and well established commercial tool instead of
implementing a set of models by themselves for the sake of
assuring the required reliability. Among the different simulation
tools that implement propagation models of electromagnetic
fields, ICS Telecom © has been selected as the most suitable for
this work because its flexibility, performance and availability.
ICS Telecom © implements several propagation models,
covering almost any radio communication service. For the
services within the scope of this work, the following models
have been pre-selected, based on the analysis of the available
literature:[5]
 Digital Television Broadcasting (470 MHz-698
MHz): ITU-R P.1546 and ITU-R P.525.
 Digital Radio Trunking (806 MHz-898 MHz):
ITU-R P.1546, Okumura/Hata/Davison and ITU-R
P.525.
In both cases, the diffraction has been computed using the
following methods: Bullington, Deygout and 526 Round Mask.
For the case of Radio Trunking, the subpath attenuation ITU-R
P.526 and no subpath losses options have been considered.
III. MEASUREMENT SET UP
Measurements have been carried out in Suba, one of the
districts of the City of Bogotá, in Colombia. Five measurement
points have been defined in that area, as shown in Fig. 1.
Fig. 1. Measurement points in the Suba district (Bogotá D. C., Colombia)
Some of the places selected to perform the measurement are
purely urban whereas others are sub-urban.
The measurement were performed on a working day, a
Saturday and a Sunday. In both cases, measurements were taken
at morning, afternoon and evening using a Agilent N9340B
Spectrum Analyzer connected to a Winradio AX24 discone
broadband antenna. The antenna factor was provided by the
manufacturer, thus the field strength can be directly measured.
The SPAN was adjusted to cover all the TDT channels and
Trunking carriers existing in that zone. The RBW were set to 50
kHz for the TDT channels and 3-5 kHz for the radio Trunking
band. In both cases, the VBW was set to RBW/10. The
measurements were taken using the peak detector with the
MAXHOLD option.
IV. RESULTS & DISCUSSION
The ANE provided the UNAL team with the data of
position and radio electric features of all the radio transmitters
in the area. Simulations were performed using the
configurations described in Section II and then compared with
the measurements in order to choose the best option in each
case, as described below.
A. TDT
The difference between simulations and measurements are
computed and averaged for the four TDT channels available at
the five emplacements within the Suba area. The best matching
is obtained for the ITU-R P.1546 Method with the ITU-R P.526
diffraction model (average difference of 4.41 dB).
B. Trunking
At each emplacement, simulations are performed at the
frequency corresponding to the carrier detected with the highest
field strength. As in the case of TDT channels, the difference
between simulations and measurements is computed and
averaged. In this case, the best matching is obtained using the
method ITU-R P.525 along with the Bullington diffraction
method and without subpath losses (average difference lower
than 8 dB). In order to validate this result, the difference
between simulations obtained using the selected configuration
and measurements is computed and averaged for the following
stronger carriers at each emplacement. This average is better
than 11.2 dB, close to the 8 dB average obtained for the
strongest carriers.
V. CONCLUSIONS
The ICS Telecom tool has been customized and adjusted for
computing the electric field strength produced by TDT and
radio Trunking transmitters. The selection and adjustment of the
numerical propagation models is based on a set of
measurements performed at different daytimes in five
emplacements in a district of the City of Bogotá. The results
obtained in this way can serve as the basis for an a priori
compliance assessment of regulatory exposure limits in a
tropical/sub tropical environment.
REFERENCES
[1] ITU. ITU-T_REC-K.52, Guidance on complying with limits for human
exposure to electromagnetic fields. 2014.
[2] IEEE Standards Coordinating Committee 28, “IEEE C95. 1-1992: IEEE
Standard for Safety Levels with Respect to Human Exposure to Radio
Frequency Electromagnetic Fields, 3 kHz to 300 GHz,
[3] E. Greenberg and E. Klodzh, “Comparison of deterministic, empirical and
physical propagation models in urban environments,” Microwaves,
Communications, Antennas and Electronic Systems (COMCAS), 2015
IEEE International Conference on. pp. 1–5, 2015.
[4] R. M. Bürgi A, Frei P, Theis G, Mohler E, Braun-Fahrländer C, Fröhlich J,
Neubauer G, Egger M, “A Model for Radiofrequency Electromagnetic
Field Predictions at Outdoor and Indoor Locations in the Context of
Epidemiological Research,” Bioelectromagn. 2010 Apr;31(3)226-36. doi
10.1002/bem.20552., 2010.
[5] D. I. Stratakis, A. I. Miaoudakis, V. G. Zacharopoulos, and T. D. Xenos,
“On the Spatial Averaging of Multiple Narrowband Electromagnetic Field
Measurements: Methods and Uncertainty Estimation,” IEEE Transactions
on Instrumentation and Measurement, vol. 59, no. 6. pp. 1520–1536, 2010.