Performance Evaluation of a Platooning Application Using the IEEE 802.11p MAC on a Control Channel Vs. a Centralized Real-Time MAC on a Service Channel

Recent advances in cooperative driving hold the potential to significantly improve safety, comfort and efficiency on our roads. An application of particular interest is platooning of trucks, where it has been shown that keeping a minimum intervehicle distance results in considerably reduced fuel consumptions. This, however, puts high requirements on timeliness and reliability of the underlying exchange of control messages between platoon members. The European profile of IEEE 802.11p, recently adopted by ETSI, defines two message types to this end, periodic beacons for basic cooperative awareness (CAM) and event-triggered decentralized environmental notification messages (DENM), both using the common control channel. The IEEE 802.11p employs a random medium access protocol, with excessive delays that may prevent proper functionality of a platooning application. To mitigate the effects of this, ETSI standardizes a decentralized congestion control algorithm to, e.g., lower the CAM frequency when needed. Some service channels with less strict requirements on send rates, data traffic types or medium access methods are available. In this paper we compare the performance of decentralized, standard-compliant inter-platoon communication using IEEE 802.11p on the control channel with a solution based on a service channel, which combines a random access phase for DENM with a centralized, scheduled access phase for CAM. A dedicated service channel for platooning applications enables us to always guarantee timely channel access of CAM packets before a specified deadline and our simulations show that this is achieved at very small sacrifices in DENM dissemination delay.