Community Broadband Networks
Home
Archives
RSS/XML
Recent Blog Headlines
About Al Bonnyman
"What's this blog thing about, anyway?"
Partial list: power utilities with fiber
Index of 2100 previous posts since March 2003
Archives
RSS/XML
Recent Blog Headlines
About Al Bonnyman
"What's this blog thing about, anyway?"
Partial list: power utilities with fiber
Sponsored by:
Fiber Planners Inc.
Designers of fiber networks for electric utilities and communities.
Index of 2100 previous posts since March 2003
Friday, February 27, 2004
Tennessee: Cleveland building ITS (intelligent transportation system)
In Tennessee the city of Cleveland is building a fiber-linked intelligent traffic system to monitor and control traffic, epsecially during shutdowns of the nearby Interstate highway. Cleveland Utilities is providing the fiber connectivity.
Cleveland is located on a stretch of Interstate 75 that is occasionally closed further north during conditions of heavy fog; the resulting traffic diversions can gridlock the entire town.
#
WiMAX: "Miles ahead of WiFi"
The Newark Star-Ledger has a good overview of the new WiMAX technology (IEEE 802.16); this may finally overcome some of the practical problems earlier wireless broadband schemes have had getting around physical obstacles such as trees.
#
Washington state: Vancouver installing fiber for upgraded traffic control system
Vancouver, Washington's traffic control system is antiquated and unreliable; the city is replacing old copper cables with new fiber optic cables and replacing the existing control system.
#
AT&T conducting BPL trial
AT&T sees BPL (broadband over power line) as a promising way to reach customers with VoIP (voice over Internet protocol) and broadband services; the company is involved in BPL trials but would not elaborate on them, according to a recent article.
#
Australia: Incumbent Telstra moving to FTTH from copper
Australia -- "Telstra is reviewing its $3 billion annual networks and systems budget, and will soon start installing fibre optics to Australian homes in place of copper. The first Australian roll-outs of fibre to the home (FTTH) technology are likely to begin this year."
#
Designing practical BPL deployments in light of the FCC's proposed rules
As noted in my post of a few minutes ago, successful BPL (broadband over power line) deployments will require careful planning in light of the FCC's proposed rules.
In the U.S., a good place to start is to see who already holds licenses in the proposed service area by using the FCC on-line license search (use the advanced search feature to search by frequency range and zip code). That will give a potential deployer an idea of how much spectrum they might have to avoid, assuming the emissions from their BPL system do not propagate very long distances. It also gives license-holder locations that can be plotted (at least those that aren't mobile).
The next step will be to evaluate different vendors' equipment for their level of emissions and their ability to immediately and automatically shift frequencies (and/or lower power) on the fly to avoid interfering with licensed services.
More available local spectrum will mean larger service cells per injection point and less fiber required for back-haul.
The system should be designed to accommodate both increased market share (more customers in a give area) and increased bandwidth demand per customer over time. That means potentially smaller cells and more injection points in the future. The designer should determine these projected locations now so as to ensure the supporting fiber cable plant is designed correctly.
The fiber cable system layout should provide sufficient extra fiber for future growth in the number of cells. While cable doesn't have to be built out to every future injection point location now, it should be be routed as close to future locations as possible and storage loops provided to allow future taps. (For more on utility fiber cable system design, see the Fiber Planners web site, especially the "Best Practices" and "Turnkey design" sections.)
#
What does the FCC's BPL ruling really mean?
Gary Box is an electrical engineer in Minneapolis who's spent much of his career dealing with RF (radio frequency) energy on power distribution systems. Of all the comments following the FCC's NPRM (notice of proposed rule making) on BPL (broadband over power line), I thought his were the most interesting:"The FCC meeting was an interesting study in politics. All of the media picked up on the soundbites from the commissioners and little or none of the technical summary. I dont think the FCC has released the text of their proposed NPRM and, according to the summary from their engineering staff at the meeting, they will actually imposed more restrictions on BPL that it had the day before:"
- "All of the BPL vendors had asked for increased emission standards; the emission standards were not changed."
- "All BPL vendors claimed no interference. The NPRM would require all BPL vendors to provide active interference mitigation, thus admitting that interference would otherwise occur. In fact, the condition that BPL must shut down if notching and power reduction is not enough remains intact, as for all part 15 devices."
- "All BPL vendors have been secretive as to the locations of their tests, and when confronted, claimed recorded interference did not come from them. The NPRM requires a national database recording the location, modulation and frequency of every BPL device. This effectively turns every BPL device into an easily tracked beacon."
"At the start of business on February 12, BPL could be deployed within the restrictions of all other Part 15 devices. When the NPRM is passed, BPL will be the most constrained of all Part 15 devices, more restricted than a baby monitor or cordless phone. This also makes BPL the least robust of all broadband approaches."
I am more optimistic about BPL than Gary, but the point is that it will take careful planning to successfully deploy a BPL system; deployments may not even be possible in some geographic areas depending on how much of the HF (high frequency) spectrum is already in use by government and private license holders.
#
Light Reading: "Fiber Makers Perk Up"
Light Reading has a short article looking at the slight overall improvement in the fiber cable business which was devastated by the telecom bust of 2001.
KMI Research does a good job of tracking the fiber business world-wide; they have just issued a new report. The free synopsis makes interesting reading.
#
Light Reading's: "Supremes Mull Municipal Broadband"
Light Reading ran an interesting overview of municipal broadband legal issues earlier this month.
#
Where are the engineers?
A quick check of the FCC commissioners' web pages reveals the following educational backgrounds:
- Powell: Government, law
- Copps: History
- Adelstein: Political science, history
- Martin: Polital science, public policy, law
Only Abernathy, a career lawyer, has an undergraduate bachelor of science degree; her biography doesn't mention the subject.
A similar check of the U.S. Congress would probably reveal only a few members with any technical education.
#
"Filling cellular holes with power line technology"
"Broadband Power Line (BPL) technology developer Corridor Systems is working on a way to use its high-speed data over power lines concept to extend and strengthen cell phone networks. Specifically, Corridor, a 3-year-old Santa Rosa, Calif. company, believes its gear can be used to transport cell signals over medium power lines into hard-to-reach cellular dead zones where it can be offloaded from the power grid via small pole- or wire-mounted antennas.
Corridor Systems is currently working with Pacific Gas & Electric on trials of BPL (broadband over power line) technology using microwave frequencies, not the much lower, longer range HF frequencies used by other systems.
(Link from Glenn Elmore)
#
Netherlands: "Fibre project refits Dutch 'ground zero'"
The New Zealand Herald does a better job of covering broadband than any other traditional English language newspaper; their latest interesting article profiles a FTTH (fiber to the home) project halfway around the world in Holland.
Several years ago, over 2000 homes were destroyed in the Dutch town of Enschede by an explosion at the nearby Roombeek fireworks factory. Now CasaNet, backed by two local housing corporations, is deploying dark fiber for FTTH providers to offer services in the newly rebuilt sections of Enschede. Eventually CasaNet expects to extend fiber to 25,000 homes.
The first service provider to use the network, Concepts ICT, is offering a triple play of voice, video and data for 60 euros per month (about $75 U.S.).
KPN, the incumbent Dutch telco, initially opposed the project. Now, "... while KPN started out claiming CasaNet would not be able to deliver the service, Kamphius [a CasaNet officer] said the financially troubled telco was now negotiating to run its services over the fibre network."
#
ZDnet: "Why broadband over power lines is a bad idea"
ZDNet's AnchorDesk feature has a strong editorial criticizing the FCC's NPRM (Notice of Proposed Rule Making) that would facilitate wider deployment of BPL (broadband over power line) technology in the U.S.
#
Japan: Tokyo Electric to merge telecom operations with Fusion Communications
Reuters -- "The telecoms arm of Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) and Internet-based telephone provider Fusion Communications Corp said on Friday they would merge their phone operations to boost their voice communications business."
TEPCO has been a major player in Japan's FTTH (fiber to the home) market.
Asahi.com also has an article on the merger.
#
Japan: NTT to have 2 million FTTH subscribers by March 2005
Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) is spending $1.8 billion to add at least 1.3 million new FTTH subscribers over the next 12 months, bringing NTT's total FTTH subscriber basis to over 2 million. Previously, NTT, the incumbent telco, has not been one of the more aggressive FTTH players in the past.
#
Thursday, February 26, 2004
Esme Vos: "Wireless for developing nations gets Soros Foundation grant"
Esme Vos' MuniWireless.com has an article on the Soros Foundation's grant to the Champaign-Urbana Community Wireless Network to develop wireless technology for use in developing nations.
#
Korea Telecom chief calls for more fiber in access network
"South Korea's experience with broadband access since 1998 indicates how fiber can play a critical role in access systems, said Yong-Kyung Lee, president and chief executive of Korea Telecom Corp., in a keynote speech opening the Optical Fiber Communication conference here. While the original Korean leap in universal broadband relied on Digital Subscriber Line services, Lee said that next-generation services cannot be supported without further fiber deployment moving toward the end user. 'The current Internet is only suitable for best-effort, store-and-forward applications,' Lee said."
"Much better support for Quality of Service and security parameters must be integrated into backbone control planes, Lee said. Each household should receive 100-Mbit/sec service in order to carry HDTV as well as broadband data traffic. South Korea leads the world in broadband penetration, with 73 percent of the population connected to the Internet via broadband access, with some 60 percent DSL-based."
"KT will begin the conversion to fiber by using a fiber-to-the-curb architecture with very high bit-rate DSL, Lee said, moving to an Ethernet-based fiber-to-the-home network late in this decade. The FTTC topology uses a flexible cell structure similar to cellular network topologies, with the size of each cell dependent on demand density in a particular neighborhood. KT also is conducting trials with Passive Optical Networks as a low-cost alternative to pushing out fiber in the network, while deploying service to homes without a traditional broadband modem. The PON trials involve both wave-division multiplexed PONs and time-division multiple-access PONs."
#
Utah: American Fork's municipal broadband hookups ahead of schedule
In Utah, American Fork city officials said progress on the city-owned broadband system is going better than planned.
#
California: "Elk Grove center of telecom battle"
In a country where many cities have no prospect of getting broadband access, here's a profile of a very unusual town near Sacramento that has multiple triple-play providers:"While Comcast provides cable and Internet connections in Elk Grove, this year the city will get two more competitors touting the "triple play" of phone, Internet and cable all on one line: Roseville-based SureWest Broadband and Frontier itself. While Comcast doesn't offer phone service yet, it is expected to. And sometime this year, Comcast is promising video-on-demand services, which SureWest already provides in some local markets, and which Frontier also promises. "
#
In the year of the Wood Monkey, optical groundwire links Bhutanese towns
"It is most likely that Paro, Gedu, Chukha, and Phuentsholing will be able to receive Bhutan broadcasting service (BBS) television live in the latter part of the year with the laying of the 110-kilometre OPGW (Optical groundwire) fibre network covering Paro, Chukha and Thimphu. The fibre network, which is being laid by Bhutan Telecom and the Bhutan Power Corporation through the existing overhead power transmission system as an alternate route to the existing digital microwave will also carry BBS TV signals."
#
Texas: Optical Solutions wins rural FTTH project
"Fiber to the premises (FTTP) market leader Optical Solutions Inc. today announced it has been awarded a contract from Border to Border Communications, an independent telephone company serving Zapata County in South Texas. "
#
Wednesday, February 25, 2004
Irish power utility provides fibre backhaul for Dublin area wireless broadband
"Wireless internet access provider Irish Broadband today announced the further development and rollout of its service in the greater Dublin area through an initiative with the ESB [Electricity Supply Board]. The company will be enabling internet connectivity for new customers from outside Dublin via the existing ESB national fibre network."
The Irish government also announced that every school in Ireland would have broadband access by the end of 2005.
#
California: City of Corona installing fiber optic traffic monitoring and control system
The City of Corona, California is installing a fiber optic intelligent traffic system (ITS):"The advanced traffic management system, which will be housed in the new City Hall, will rely on fiber optic cables, computerized controllers and cameras to monitor traffic conditions and program signals to adjust to volumes. Rafael Martinez, associate traffic engineer, said the computerized controllers will send data on the speed, volume and patterns of cars traveling city streets through the 16.7 miles of fiber optic cables to the traffic management center. Employees operating the system can either make adjustments to increases or decreases in traffic or let the computer implement a pre-programmed plan to adapt to the changes, he said."
"The system will use nine cameras to monitor traffic and three message signs to warn drivers of traffic snags and encourage alternate routes. It also will be connected to the Internet so that residents can check traffic conditions."
"Rusty Beardsley, traffic engineer, said the key to the system is that it will be connected to Caltrans' system. Caltrans controls the signals that are tied to freeway access, something many drivers in the city don't realize, Beardsley said. Caltrans controls the signals that are tied to freeway access, something many drivers in the city don't realize, Beardsley said. The city and the agency have been working together to get the two systems coordinating better, especially if there is a freeway accident or some other incident out of the norm, he said."
#
Salira updates PON offerings, announces China deployments
"Salira Optical Network Systems Inc. has updated its Salira 2000 passive-optical system with support for STM-1/OC-3 and T1/E1 network interfaces. Concurrent with the general availability of release 2.2 hardware and software, Salira has announced a deployment deal in China with Guangdong China Unicom, which will use the Salira 2000 system in five cities: Foshan, Shunde, Nanhai, Shansui and Gaoming."
#
Michigan: Oakland County School Board officials resign
"Embattled Oakland Schools Board President Carol Borich is stepping down today - a day after the district's vice president, DiAnne Cagle Leitermann announced her resignation. Borich's resignation is effective at 4 p.m. The Free Press has reported that the district awarded millions of dollars in no-bid contracts for high-tech schemes that fizzled and spent $9 million in special education money on a fiber-optic network."
There's a right way and a wrong way to bring broadband to a community. With proper planning and execution, there's no need to have this sort of crisis.
#
New York: Ithaca City Schools tap into Cornell University's network to enrich local education
In New York State, the Ithaca City School District uses a fiber link to bring the resources of Cornell University, one of the world's top research universities, into local classrooms."A fiber GigE connection to Cornell's 'backbone' delivers all CU's public content to our network 100 times faster than our Internet connection used to connect us. Cornell Global Seminars Video Conferencing Server will allow teams of IHS students to collaborate with other high schools in a variety of science-centric course work."
#
Canada: "Fibre firm takes telecom out of the trenches"
"A Vancouver company thinks it has the solution to solving last mile headaches without tearing up the downtown core. TeraSpan Networks has developed a vertical inlaid fibre system of trenchless deployment. Instead of tearing up the street a saw cut is made down the asphalt or a crack cut in the sidewalk, and the cable is dropped in and then filled over."
This is a good article on TeraSpan's inlaid cable system for placing fiber cable in roadways and sidewalks with out costly and disruptive trenching or directional drilling.
Sprint Canada is using the system and likes it despite some critics' concerns that these installations are not as robust as fiber cable buried deeper in conduits. As the Sprint manager points out, the only real protection against interruptions is a truly redundant system laid out in a ring topology. (Note, the other cable has to follow a different route -- it can't just be a few ducts away in the same duct bank, a shortcut sometimes taken.)
A backhoe digging in the wrong place is usually going to take out a cable whether it's a few inches into the road surface or two feet below it. (A much safer exception to this would be fiber cable placed really deep below other utilities, but that's usually only done in conjunction with a sewer system deployment)
30 years ago, buried cable installations were more reliable than aerial installations, but this is no longer true, especially in big cities where there is so much utility construction. Buried cable installations are certainly more expensive. In extreme cases, they can cost hundreds of thousand of dollars per mile in places like Manhattan.
By substantially reducing costs, the TeraSpan system may actually facilitate better reliability by making it easier to cost-justify and deploy redundant fiber. The fiber cable itself only costs only a few thousand dollars per mile depending on fiber counts.
#
Alabama: Baldwin County building a fiber optic WAN
Baldwin County, Alabama will be building a fiber optic wide area network (WAN).
#
Tuesday, February 24, 2004
Utilities, fiber optics, telecommunications and broadband over power lines
Increasingly, the web's high tech and policy pundits are looking at power utilities and their current and future roles in telecommunications.
Slashdot has an entry today on BPL (broadband over power lines). The majority of the comments posted (both pro- and anti-BPL) are just plain incorrect; BPL is a pretty esoteric field few understand but many are commenting on. Good places to start to really understand the issues are with yesterday's actual FCC notice and the VJLT article I posted a note about earlier.
There seems to be a lot of confusion about the economics and competitiveness of this technology with ill-informed arguments on both sides over whether BPL is primarily best-suited for under-served rural areas. For the reasons I noted in my comments on the Wired article yesterday, it's potentially ideal for small towns, but not necessarily the surrounding countryside.
As we evaluate competing BPL technologies for our utility clients, it's important to understand that managing radio interference issues is the key to successful BPL deployments. The high frequency spectrum BPL shares with many different licensed users is unique -- it's virtually the only spectrum available for over-the-horizon communications. That makes it critical for all sorts of public safety, military, nautical and aeronautical users. Shifting these users to higher frequencies won't work since the range just isn't there; only a re-engineering of the earth's ionosphere will change that. (One Slashdot commentator said that push-to-talk cell phone technology had obsoleted use of these older HF frequencies -- I suggest he try calling out of town on his Nextel phone during the next big hurricane in his area.)
Some BPL advocates are saying that the interference issues go away if you just strip ham radio operators of their HF spectrum allocation -- not realizing that amateur radio operations make up just a fraction of the spectrum used by BPL. Others acknowledge that amateurs play a critical role in emergency communications during disasters, but suggest that hams should only operate during disasters when the power's off and BPL systems are down. If you think about it, that's like outlawing the use of 4-wheel drive vehicles except during bad snowstorms -- don't expect many people to invest in Jeeps and Hummers just to drive the doctor next door to the hospital during a blizzard.
The bottom line is that the only way to make BPL work is with a well-planned deployment using frequency-agile BPL equipment deployed in cooperation with local HF frequency users.
UCLA policy professor Mark Kleiman has a blog entry today on this subject where he quotes a Fiber Planners web page, "Electric utilities and fiber optics -- why?" summarizing power utility's fiber activities.
Most utility fiber is installed for reasons other than just "the pretext of using it for remote meter-reading" as Dr. Kleiman put it. Utilities have large, widely dispersed staffs and assets; prior to utilities' installing their own fiber starting in the 1980s, they tied with local governments as the Bells' biggest customers in any given state. Furthermore, when they used leased lines from the Bells, they paid higher than normal rates in order to have guaranteed quality and 24x7 availability (in order to guarantee safe and rapid breaker operations). Microwave and other wireless systems have also been used, but they've never developed the reputation for uptime and reliability fiber has for critical utility applications such as relaying and SCADA.
Utilities have often installed additional fiber to resell to other users, however energy regulators have always been very scrupulous about cross-subsidization issues, so in the case of investor-owned utilities, this extra fiber has been installed at shareholder risk and expense, not the ratepayers'.
Municipally-owned utilities have also been aggressive users of fiber and have used it not only to link utility assets but also various community bandwidth users such as schools and government offices.
It's important to realize that at a cost of $5,000 to $10,000 per mile (depending on fiber counts and local conditions), most of this fiber is installed upstream of substations. Utilities that want to offer last mile broadband access have three major technologies to choose from:
- Broadband over power line
- Fiber to the user
- Wireless
Fiber to the user offers far and away the best service (voice, data, video), but at $1500 to $2000 per subscriber, it requires a big investment, something many BPL opponents don't always understand when they say utilities should just run fiber to every home.
BPL offers utilities a way to sign up customers now with a low cost broadband technology, then deploy fiber on a pay-as-you-go basis closer and closer to the subscribers as bandwidth demands and market share increase.
We're bullish on all three technologies; in our practical experience, the best choice for a community or utility will depend more on market and human factors than technology:
- Local availability of broadband from other providers
- Local reputation of competing broadband providers
- Utility leadership and culture
- Community leadership
- Local and state politics
- Competing investment requirements within the utility
#
Monday, February 23, 2004
Community Broadband Networks' one year anniversary
This site's one-year anniversary passed unnoticed even by me (I was sick) on Friday, February 20. The site's archives contain almost 1900 different entries on various utility and municipal broadband projects and technologies.
I like to think of these many entries as both an idea book and a cookbook for utility and community leaders looking at ways they can improve their own communities.
I extend my thanks to the hundreds of regular subcribers and visitors that have helped support this effort. I also very much appreciate the support the site's sponsor (and my employer), Fiber Planners, has given this project.
Please let me know your thoughts on what you'd like to see over the next 12 months.
#
FCC issues "Notice of Proposed Rule Making" for BPL systems
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today released its' 38-page Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) for "amendment of part 15 regarding new requirements and measurement guidelines for Access Broadband over Power Line Systems".
In other words, the FCC is releasing the outline of their proposed rules governing BPL (broadband over power line) systems in the U.S.
The public has 45 days in which to file comments on the NPRM. Comments can be filed on-line.
#
Recent BPL (broadband over power line) news:
Colorado: "Plug-in Internet for the rural West?"
Marsha Austin with the Denver Post reports that San Isabel Electric Association is interested in BPL as a means of bringing broadband to a rural area where many customers don't have broadband available. Another cooperative, United Power, is also looking at BPL, but more cautiously, since many of its' members already have access to broadband. Colorado's largest utility, Xcel Energy's Public Service Company of Colorado unit, has looked at the technology but has no plans to deploy it in the foreseeable future. The story includes sidebar lists of utilities deploying BPL; BroadbandReports.com also has a note on the Denver Post story.
...Earthlink invests in Ambient Technology
Internet service provider (ISP) Earthlink has invested $500,000 in BPL equipment vendor Ambient Technology with warrants to increase its' stake in the future; Ambient and Earthlink collaborated on an earlier BPL pilot with New York utility Con Edison.
As we noted earlier today, Earthlink is also working with Progress Energy on the BPL pilot in North Carolina using equipment from Amperion, a competitor of Ambient's; BroadbandReports.com posted a story on this project last week.
..."Copps: FCC Avoids Tough Questions in Broadband Power Line"
XCHANGE reported February 16: "The FCC on Thursday proposed changes to technical rules to foster the development of broadband access over electrical lines. But FCC Commissioner Michael Copps, who supported the technical proposals and questions, says the agency is avoiding some tough questions related to broadband power line (BPL) -- such as how to handle competitive issues and cross-subsidization between a regulated power industry and an unregulated communications business."
Link to Copps' statement
The competition question is interesting but probably worth deferring until BPL really proves itself in the U.S. Presently the technology is mostly in the pilot project phase and requiring competitive access now would complicate these pilot projects. Furthermore, that question should perhaps be dealt with in a broader context. Wireless broadband and cable TV operators, for instance, don't have to open their networks to competitors but phone companies do.
While it may be news to Commissioner Copps, the cross-subsidization issue has been around for years and dealt with by a variety of regulatory bodies and laws covering the power utility industry. Legislators and energy regulators have always worried about energy customers involuntarily subsidizing utility telecommunications ventures; by contrast, the FCC has never before been worried that someone might subsidize overly cheap broadband!
...Wired: "New Outlet for High-Speed Access"
Wired has a general overview of the FCC's recent meeting about BPL. The best part comes at the end, where EPRI's adviser on the subject, Bill Blair, explains why the economics may not be good enough for BPL in rural areas while competitive technologies (DSL and cable) may be too well-established in urban and suburban areas. This is not an insight you hear very often; too bad the article did not take it further to find the real market for BPL -- small towns.
At Fiber Planners, we've held the view for some time that the best market for this technology will likely be in small towns. They have high 'line densities' (typically 50 homes per mile of power line -- ideal for BPL). They also receive little investment from incumbent telephone and cable TV companies. Millions of Americans that don't live in or near a metropolitan area also do not truly live in the countryside on a farm (where line densities may be 10 homes per mile or less) but in these rural towns.
I continue to be surprised at how little the high tech and telecommunications intelligentsia understand or take an interest in the real patterns of life and commerce outside the nation's big metropolitan areas. Too bad -- it's a big market.
...BPL developments in Portugal and France
The Dutch site Telecom.Paper recently ran two articles on BPL; unfortunately the free articles have expired and you'll have to pay to view them:Portugal: "Tecnocom in powerline comms talks with EDP, Oni"
"Portuguese telecom company Tecnocom is in talks with EDP and Oni to offer broadband via powerline communications (PLC) technology."
France: "Cegetel to trial powerline communication services"
"Cegetel, the alternative fixed network provider in France, has launched a test for so-called powerline communication services ..."
...Follow-up artilces on the FCC's new rules for BPL
Several articles appeared after the FCC's February 12 announcement of its' proposed new rules for broadband power line systems:Karl Bode: "Electro-High Speed -- BPL technology coming soon?"
ARRL: "FCC Okays BPL Proposal; ARRL Officials Express Disappointment"
XCHANGE: "FCC Moves Forward with Work on Broadband Power Line Technology"
ARRL: "FCC Chairman Assures Congressman on BPL Studies"
Computerworld: "FCC moves ahead with power-line broadband rules"
RCR Wireless News: "FCC proposes technical rules for broadband over power lines"
...Preminet Receives Additional Orders for PLC Equipment from China
Preminet, a Kinden Corp. subsidiary, announced February 9 that it has received new orders for power line communications (PLC) devices from a Chinese power company. A joint venture established by ITRAN Communications of Israel, Macnica, Alps Electric as well as Kinden, Preminet has been participating in a PLC trial service in China since March 2003, providing 150 residents in Beijing with Internet connectivity that is purely based on PLC technologies. Recently, the Chinese company decided to expand the trial service to cover a total of 2,000 households, which will all be using PLC devices that are manufactured by three Preminet affiliates."
...
Minnesota: Rochester Public Utilities to conduct BPL trial
Municipally-owned Rochester Public utilities will collaborate with Hiawatha Broadband Communications in conducting a BPL trial in Rochester.
...
North Carolina: Duke Power to conduct BPL trial near Charlotte
A news report on the Progress Energy/Earthlink BPL trial notes that neighboring utility Duke Power will also be testing the technology:
"Duke Power has sent out letters in the past few weeks to solicit up to 500 households and businesses in southeast Charlotte interested in free broadband service as the company tests a similar service, spokesman Thomas Williams said. 'We've been pleased with the initial response,' he said. The company's six-month pilot will begin in late spring, Williams said."
#
Virginia: Pulaski County officials trying to catch up with other areas' broadband availability
February 19: "Educators, planners and economic developers want government leaders in Pulaski County to invest in broadband Internet fiber to keep the county competitive. 'It's about becoming more competitive in the marketplace,' said Ted Settle, Virginia Tech's economic initiatives and marketing research director. He said broadband access is becoming as important to businesses as basic utilities like water and electricity."
"'There are a lot of things going on. Competition is tough,' said Carl Epley, a retired University of Virginia and Virginia Tech engineering instructor who heads the county's telecommunications committee. 'If we're going to stanch the loss of jobs and the loss of revenue, we're going to have to change what we're doing.' The committee invited elected leaders from the county and towns of Pulaski and Dublin to a meeting on telecommunications Tuesday night."
"New River Community College has linked its T-1 lines to Pulaski County High School, about six miles from where the telecommunications meeting was being held at the Pulaski County Public Library. It would cost about $10,000 a mile to bring broadband fiber from the high school to downtown Pulaski, he said. But the school system is paying $8,952 per month for the rest of the insufficient Internet data lines it uses now, Sandidge said. 'If somehow we had fiber, you can see what it would do to the budget," he said. "I'm going to get a payback pretty quickly. This is not rocket science.'"
#
Spain: Endesa offering BPL in Barcelona, Saragossa
Spanish power utility Endesa is introducing BPL (broadband over power line) in Barcelona:"Endesa announces that after the successful commercial launch in
Saragossa, Endesa Net Factory and AUNA starts the commercialization of PLC
services in Barcelona, that enables to offer voice and broadband
telecommunication services through low and medium voltage electricity network.
The deployment of the PLC network in Barcelona, made jointly with Fecsa-Endesa,
started last December and covers, in this first phase, around 5,000 households."
"The commercial deployment in Zaragoza has confirmed not only the technical
viability of the PLC technology, but also the commercial satisfaction by the
users. The commercial penetration in the deployment area has reached a 19% rate.
Users mostly contracted simultaneously broadband Internet and telephony
services."
#
North Carolina: Progress Energy, EarthLink partner for BPL pilot
"Progress Energy and Atlanta-based EarthLink are teaming up to test broadband Internet service in several southern Wake County neighborhoods via the power lines. This partnership marks the first time in North Carolina that high-speed Internet service is available commercially over the power lines."
"'Providing high-speed Internet service via our power lines holds great potential,' said Matt Oja, director of emerging technologies at Raleigh-based Progress Energy. 'It could offer a very competitive option for broadband users in our service territories, especially in rural areas not currently or easily served by other high-speed Internet providers.'"
"Only about 500 homes in southern Wake County will have the opportunity to participate in this high-speed service. Those customers who do sign up for the new service will receive EarthLink High Speed Internet through wireless technology that uses the signal sent over Progress Energy power lines. The wireless equipment, which will allow customers to connect to the Internet from anywhere inside the home near a power outlet, is free at signup. After that, the service costs $19.95 a month for the first three months and $39.95 per month thereafter."
"Progress Energy is one of more than a dozen utilities nationwide testing the delivery of broadband over power lines (BPL). The first phase of the test, completed in June 2003, involved about 25 computers in residential/commercial locations and monitoring of distribution line equipment in the North Raleigh area. This second phase will allow customers in selected neighborhoods to purchase the service through EarthLink. Using technology developed by Massachusetts-based Amperion, Progress Energy can transmit data to a neighborhood relay point over a combination of fiber optics and power lines. Special devices attached to existing electric poles and transformers then send a wireless signal into homes and devices."
#
"Lafayette, Louisiana Deploys World's Largest Rural Public Wi-Fi Network and Brings Mobile Broadband Connectivity to Mardi Gras"
February 19: Syndeo, a full-service communications company specializing in the deployment and operation of metro-scale wireless networks, today announced that, using equipment from Tropos Networks, they have successfully gone live with the world's largest rural public Wi-Fi network which will be showcased during Lafayette's Mardi Gras celebration. The 13 square mile network makes wireless mobile broadband data connections available to businesses, schools and residences throughout the Lafayette parish. At Mardi Gras, Syndeo will provide free public Wi-Fi access along with real-time video monitoring and emergency medical services to ensure public safety. With a slight spin on Cajun tradition, Syndeo's CEO Sam Robertson describes the annual event as 'parades, music, beads and Wi-Fi.'"
"'By providing metro-scale, mobile broadband access throughout Lafayette, we are laying the much needed foundation for the technology infrastructure that will support and enhance the economy,' said Joey Durel, Lafayette parish president. 'The network will provide the fundamental connectivity that we were lacking to make technology an everyday way of life and allow people and businesses to be more efficient and cost-effective. And, significantly, it will help us overcome a major hurdle and be a key asset in attracting new business to the area.'"
"Using the outdoor-optimized Tropos 5110 Wi-Fi cells, Syndeo has "unwired" more than 13 square miles of Lafayette. For the lowest cost and easy access, the network is accessible via standard 802.11 client devices ... With the successful deployment of the network, each subscriber now has access to true broadband connectivity (greater than 1 Mbps)."
The municipally-owned Lafayette Utilities System already has an extensive fiber optic network serving government, business, utility and wholesale telecommunications customers throughout the city.
#
More excuses; posts to follow
There have been no more blog entries since my return last week; my children got sick with some virus from school and then spread it to my wife and me.
We're all better now, so I hope to start catching up today or tomorrow.
A.B.
#
The Octopus Files
My Popdex Game Profile
Popdex
Metapop
Technorati Profile
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
