5G in our environment
April 17, 2025
How much radiofrequency radiation are we being exposed to in our environment?
Swiss researchers have shed new light on this question by developing a more relevant way to test radiation levels in the environment.
In a paper published recently in the journal Environmental Research, they describe how they did it.
The researchers took measurements of radiation levels in Swiss urban and rural area in different microenvironments – such as residential areas, industrial areas, parks, public transport, shopping malls and schools.
Unlike previous studies, they took into account the distinctive features of 5G transmitters. This is because 5G base stations operating at 3.5 GHz – a frequency common in Australia – and use a technology called Massive MIMO which enables them to direct a beam of radiation towards the user (called beamforming). It’s like shining a spotlight of radiation on the area.
The use of beamforming technology poses problems for measuring radiation because levels of radiation in an area will vary according to whether a person is using a 5G mobile phone or not.
To address this, the researchers measured radiofrequency radiation levels in three scenarios:
- with the tester’s mobile phone off or in flight mode;
- with the tester’s mobile phone repeatedly downloading (DL) a file and
- with the tester’s mobile phone repeatedly uploading (UL) a file.
Not surprisingly, they found that exposure levels were ‘substantially higher’ while the tester downloaded and uploaded files.
‘Across measured microenvironments and study areas, exposure levels tended to be lower during the non-user scenario, followed by the max DL scenario and highest during the max UL scenario,’ the researchers reported.
Measuring exposure in this way resulted in quite different results to those reported previously. The authors said, ‘the contribution of the 5G band during max DL is almost four times higher than what was previously reported … for spot measurements using spectrum analyzer in Bern, Switzerland.’
Adriana Fernandes Veludo, Bram Stroobandt, Han Van Bladel, Nekane Sandoval-Diez, Mònica Guxens, Wout Joseph, Martin Röösli, Exploring RF-EMF levels in Swiss microenvironments: An evaluation of environmental and auto-induced downlink and uplink exposure in the era of 5G, Environmental Research, Volume 266, 2025, 120550, ISSN 0013-9351, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envr....
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