Export of Energy Consumption Information in IPFIX
draft-yan-opsawg-ipfix-energy-consumption-01

OPSAWG                                                       Jinjie. Yan
Internet-Draft                                           ZTE Corporation
Intended status: Standards Track                             Jinming. Li
Expires: 3 September 2026                                   China Mobile
                                                            2 March 2026

           Export of Energy Consumption Information in IPFIX
              draft-yan-opsawg-ipfix-energy-consumption-01

Abstract

   This document introduces new IPFIX IEs for exporting energy
   consumption information of physical entities in a network device.
   New Information Elements are defined to report instantaneous and
   average energy consumption information at device, line-card, and port
   granularity.

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Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
     1.1.  Requirements Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   2.  Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   3.  New IPFIX IEs for Energy Consumption Information  . . . . . .   3
     3.1.  deviceRealtimePower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
     3.2.  deviceAveragePower  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
     3.3.  lineCardRealtimePower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
     3.4.  lineCardAveragePower  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
     3.5.  portRealtimePower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5
     3.6.  portAveragePower  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5
   4.  Use Cases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
     4.1.  Energy-Aware Routing  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
     4.2.  Per-Flow Energy Consumption Monitoring  . . . . . . . . .   6
   5.  Operational Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   6.  Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
   7.  IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
   8.  Acknowledgements  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
   9.  References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
     9.1.  Normative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
   Authors' Addresses  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   9

1.  Introduction

   Energy consumption has emerged as a critical operational metric in
   modern data centers and communication networks, driven by increasing
   demands for sustainability and cost efficiency.  Operators require
   accurate, traffic-correlated power information to support
   applications such as energy-aware routing, per-service energy cost
   accounting, and fine-grained power management.

   Traditional monitoring protocols, like SNMP, rely on periodic
   polling, which often fails to capture the dynamic interplay between
   traffic loads and power draw, leading to delayed or inaccurate
   insights.  In contrast, the IP Flow Information Export (IPFIX)
   protocol [RFC7011] offers a proven, event-driven framework that
   inherently binds metering observations to traffic events at the
   source, ensuring timely and causal reporting.

   To address these needs, this document defines six new Information
   Elements (IEs) that enable an IPFIX Exporting Process to report
   energy consumption for physical entities within a network device,
   including the entire device, line cards, and ports.  These IEs
   support both instantaneous (realtime) power values, which provide
   snapshots at the moment of export for immediate analysis, and average
   power values over the measurement interval since the last export,
   which are useful for trend detection and aggregated accounting.  The

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   measurements are exported via existing IPFIX triggering
   mechanisms—such as packet count thresholds, active timeouts, and
   inactive timeouts—preserving causality between observed traffic and
   reported energy metrics.

   This document introduces new IPFIX IEs for exporting energy
   consumption information of physical entities in a network device to
   facilitate energy-aware networking by providing granular, real-time
   data for optimized network operations.

1.1.  Requirements Language

   The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
   "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
   document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119].

2.  Terminology

   This document makes use of the terms defined in [RFC7011]:

   *  IPFIX

   *  IPFIX Information Elements

   *  Exporting Process

   *  Metering Process

   *  Template Record

   *  Data Record

   *  Exporter

   *  Collector

3.  New IPFIX IEs for Energy Consumption Information

   The following new Information Elements are defined:

3.1.  deviceRealtimePower

   Name：deviceRealtimePower

   ElementID: TBD1

   Description: Instantaneous total power consumption of the entire
   exporting device at the time of export.

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   Abstract Data Type: unsigned32

   Data Type Semantics: quantity

   Units: watts

   Reference: This document.

3.2.  deviceAveragePower

   Name：deviceAveragePower

   ElementID: TBD2

   Description: Average total power consumption of the entire exporting
   device over the interval since the last export of this Template.

   Abstract Data Type: unsigned32

   Data Type Semantics: quantity

   Units: watts

   Reference: This document.

3.3.  lineCardRealtimePower

   Name：lineCardRealtimePower

   ElementID: TBD3

   Description: Instantaneous power consumption of the line card at the
   time of export.

   Abstract Data Type: unsigned32

   Data Type Semantics: quantity

   Units: milliwatts

   Reference: This document.

3.4.  lineCardAveragePower

   Name：lineCardAveragePower

   ElementID: TBD4

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   Description: Average power consumption of the line card identified
   over the interval since the last export.

   Abstract Data Type: unsigned32

   Data Type Semantics: quantity

   Units: milliwatts

   Reference: This document.

3.5.  portRealtimePower

   Name：portRealtimePower

   ElementID: TBD5

   Description: Instantaneous power consumption of the port at the time
   of export.

   Abstract Data Type: unsigned32

   Data Type Semantics: quantity

   Units: milliwatts

   Reference: This document.

3.6.  portAveragePower

   Name：portAveragePower

   ElementID: TBD6

   Description: Average power consumption of the port over the interval
   since the last export.

   Abstract Data Type: unsigned32

   Data Type Semantics: quantity

   Units: milliwatts

   Reference: This document.

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4.  Use Cases

4.1.  Energy-Aware Routing

   In this scenario, network controllers may require accurate, traffic-
   correlated power consumption metrics of physical links (represented
   by ports) to compute paths that minimize total energy cost.
   Traditional periodic polling mechanisms often fail to capture the
   dynamic relationship between instantaneous traffic load and actual
   power draw, leading to suboptimal routing decisions.

   By leveraging the IPFIX-based energy telemetry defined in this
   document, a network device can export multi-level power consumption
   data (e.g., port, line card, and device levels) triggered by traffic
   events such as packet count thresholds or active/inactive timeouts.
   The exported data records can provide both instantaneous and average
   power values over the observation interval, enabling the controller
   to derive meaningful energy cost metrics, such as per-link energy-
   per-bit or average power under load, for use in path computation
   algorithms.  This tight coupling between traffic behavior and energy
   reporting ensures that routing decisions reflect real-time energy
   efficiency characteristics of network links.

4.2.  Per-Flow Energy Consumption Monitoring

   For fine-grained energy accounting and auditing of specific high-
   bandwidth ("elephant") flows, such as backup traffic between data
   center servers, it is essential to attribute the energy consumed
   across multiple physical components (e.g., ingress/egress ports and
   their respective line cards) to the flow itself.

   Using the mechanisms described in this document, an IPFIX Exporting
   Process can associate energy consumption measurements with a specific
   IP flow (identified by, e.g., a 5-tuple) and trigger synchronized
   reporting when predefined traffic thresholds are met.  By including
   physical entity identifiers (e.g., lineCardId, portId) and the newly
   defined energy Information Elements, the exporter can generate
   multiple correlated data records corresponding to the various
   physical interfaces involved in forwarding the flow.  This enables
   collectors to reconstruct a complete, multi-path energy footprint of
   the flow across the device, supporting accurate per-flow energy cost
   attribution and operational analysis.

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5.  Operational Considerations

   The export and interpretation of energy consumption information in
   IPFIX are intended to be driven by traffic activity observed at
   specific points in the data plane.  Implementations SHOULD configure
   monitoring policies that associate one or more physical entities—such
   as a device, line card, or port—with an observation object (e.g., an
   interface or a flow).

   Energy telemetry records SHOULD be generated when predefined traffic-
   driven conditions are met.  These conditions MAY include:

   *  The number of packets observed since the last export exceeds a
      configured threshold;

   *  An active timeout elapses under continuous but low-volume traffic;
      or

   *  An inactive timeout elapses after no packets are observed for a
      configured duration.

   The Exporting Process collects power measurements—such as
   instantaneous and average power—for each associated physical entity.
   These measurements are encoded into Data Records using the newly
   defined energy Information Elements (e.g., lineCardRealtimePower,
   portAveragePower).  Each Data Record SHOULD also include identifier
   Information Elements (e.g., lineCardId, portId) to unambiguously
   associate the reported energy values with their corresponding
   hardware components.

   The resulting Data Records are exported to a Collector within an
   IPFIX Message, along with a reference to the applicable Template
   Record (e.g., via Template ID).

   A Collector receiving such messages SHOULD possess the corresponding
   Template Record to correctly parse the structure and semantics of the
   Data Records.

   The Collector parses each Data Record to recover:

   *  The identifier(s) of the physical entity (or entities) linked to
      the observation object; and

   *  The associated energy consumption information.

   This end-to-end mechanism ensures that energy reports are causally
   tied to traffic activity.

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6.  Security Considerations

   TBA

7.  IANA Considerations

   This document requests IANA to create a new IE under the "IPFIX
   Information Elements" registry [RFC7012] available at [IANA-IPFIX].

           +------------+-----------------------+-------------+
           | Element ID | Name                  | Reference   |
           +------------+-----------------------+-------------+
           | TBD1       | deviceRealtimePower   | Section 3.1 |
           +------------+-----------------------+-------------+
           | TBD2       | deviceAveragePower    | Section 3.2 |
           +------------+-----------------------+-------------+
           | TBD3       | lineCardRealtimePower | Section 3.3 |
           +------------+-----------------------+-------------+
           | TBD4       | lineCardAveragePower  | Section 3.4 |
           +------------+-----------------------+-------------+
           | TBD5       | portRealtimePower     | Section 3.5 |
           +------------+-----------------------+-------------+
           | TBD6       | portAveragePower      | Section 3.6 |
           +------------+-----------------------+-------------+

               Table 1: IPFIX Information Elements Registry

8.  Acknowledgements

   TBA

9.  References

9.1.  Normative References

   [IANA-IPFIX]
              IANA, "IP Flow Information Export (IPFIX) Entities",
              <https://www.iana.org/assignments/ipfix>.

   [RFC2119]  Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
              Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
              DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2119>.

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   [RFC7011]  Claise, B., Ed., Trammell, B., Ed., and P. Aitken,
              "Specification of the IP Flow Information Export (IPFIX)
              Protocol for the Exchange of Flow Information", STD 77,
              RFC 7011, DOI 10.17487/RFC7011, September 2013,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7011>.

   [RFC7012]  Claise, B., Ed. and B. Trammell, Ed., "Information Model
              for IP Flow Information Export (IPFIX)", RFC 7012,
              DOI 10.17487/RFC7012, September 2013,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7012>.

Authors' Addresses

   Jinjie Yan
   ZTE Corporation
   China
   Email: yan.jinjie@zte.com.cn

   Jinming Li
   China Mobile
   China
   Email: lijinming@chinamobile.com.cn

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