[US] Broadband over power lines

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Communications: After years of delay, the provision of internet access over power lines is taking off—though not for the reasons you might expect

THIS is “a banner day...a historically significant day for communications,” declared Michael Powell in mid-October. The chairman of America's Federal Communications Commission (FCC) was enthusing about the prospects of a novel way for customers to receive ultra-fast broadband internet service in their homes: via the stodgy old power grid.

The idea of using the power grid as a communications network—known as “broadband over power lines” (BPL) in America and “power-line communications” (PLC) in Europe—has been around for ages, but is at last being implemented. Mr Powell made his comments at a meeting where the FCC gave its formal blessing to BPL. Crucially, the agency ruled that utilities that follow certain rules (chiefly concerning radio interference) would be given a wide berth to operate as “unlicensed” entities, unencumbered by America's baffling telecoms rules.

The Federal Communications Commission recently approved rules on "broadband over power lines" (click here and here). Current Communications is a leading supplier of such services. See also Cinergy and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

Why bother with BPL? The FCC is keen because it will bring into the broadband market a third group of competitors, after telephone firms, which use supercharged phone lines (digital subscriber lines, or DSL) to deliver broadband, and cable-TV operators, which use their cables for the same purpose. Another competing technology should lower prices. BPL may also further the FCC's goal of universal broadband service. The use of power lines means almost everyone in the rich world should be able to receive broadband service through this approach. That is not true for cable, which does not have universal coverage. Utilities are already eyeing new markets in rural areas.

William Berkman of Current Communications, a leading BPL operator, argues that the technology offers several advantages for customers, too. Connection speed is not dependent on the distance from a telephone exchange (as with DSL) or on the number of customers online at once (as with cable). BPL, unlike its rivals, offers uploads at the same speed as downloads. And, says Mr Berkman, it will ultimately offer far more capacity than today's cable networks. “This is a bet on bandwidth,” he says. “You want video and TiVo over the internet? You'll get it.”

Yet old hands remain sceptical, for BPL is hardly a new technology. Indeed, engineers tried to make it work for many years, but failed due to snags in the “last mile”: in particular, the final “step-down” power transformer, at the point where the power from the grid enters a home or office, interfered with the flow of data.

But two new ways have been devised to solve this problem. One is to route around the step-down transformer using wireless technology. The transformer is often on a utility pole outside the customer's premises, so it need only be a short hop to a wireless receiver indoors. The other approach routes the data signal around the transformer and then feeds it back into the domestic electricity supply. A special modem plugged into an electrical outlet then deciphers the signal. This approach also allows domestic electrical wiring to double as a home network.

Despite these steps forward, several problems may yet derail BPL. One is security. Some worry that it may be too easy to pilfer your neighbour's e-mails by intercepting the signal from the wireless transmitter sitting on the pole between your houses. But early field trials—and there have been several dozen such trials, in America, Canada and Europe—suggest that this worry is misplaced. The most advanced trial is taking place in Cincinnati, Ohio, where some 15,000 customers now receive BPL on commercial terms.

Jim Rogers, the boss of Cinergy, the trail-blazing local utility, points to the second potential snag facing BPL: the stodginess of utilities. Traditionally, the sector has not been very innovative, but in this case caution might be justified. Mr Rogers notes that risky broadband investments would need to be made today out of unregulated profits—but with no guarantee that regulators would not claw back BPL profits tomorrow as “regulated” earnings.

Another concern is radio interference. Ham-radio operators have complained vociferously that BPL signals are “bleeding” from power lines and spoiling their hobby. The emergency services use some frequencies that may be affected too. So the FCC's October ruling establishes “excluded frequency bands” for aeronautical communications and public safety. Firms that manufacture BPL gear must “notch out” emissions within those bands, and win pre-certification from the FCC for their equipment. The regulators also created a database for tracking reports of alleged BPL interference. Even so, the ham-radio operators were not satisfied. Yet they claim that the technology will fail to take off anyway. Their trade association claims that other broadband technologies, such as Wi-Fi and new fibre-optics networks, will “leave BPL in the footnotes of technology along with the eight-track tape player.”

Perhaps. But there is reason to believe that BPL might finally start to live up to its potential, thanks to an unexpected ace in the hole that DSL and cable do not have: the big blackouts that hit North America, London and Italy last summer. Those fiascos were the result not of a shortage of generating capacity, but rather of the failings of an antiquated grid. Today's electrical system is a creaking relic lacking the sophisticated command-and-control tools necessary to ensure reliability. As last summer's outage in America showed, local operators often do not know when or where power has gone out on their system.

BPL could change all of that. A beautiful side benefit of the technology is that data-enabling their power networks will let utilities monitor what is happening on their power grids in real time, down to local substations. The technology could also allow them to read power and water meters without entering customers' premises. Mr Rogers of Cinergy notes that it might also allow utilities to manage peak loads by, for example, turning down your residential air conditioner remotely while you are at the office, in return for a lower tariff.

“The reliability aspects are unbelievable!” gushed Nora Brownell in October as she toured a utility in Virginia that has implemented BPL. Her view matters, for she is a commissioner on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), the country's top regulator of power utilities. In a telling and unorthodox show of support for the new technology, the FERC's commissioners turned up at the FCC meeting at which BPL was given the green light. Pat Wood, the FERC's boss, even offered this forecast: “It's my hope that a year from now boards of directors and shareholders and customers are all asking utilities, ‘Why aren't you in BPL?’”

It finally looks as though BPL's day has come. The happy collision of Mr Powell's desire for broadband competition and Mr Wood's dream of grid reliability is spurring on BPL technology. Revealingly, European officials, who have in the past been cautious about PLC technology, applauded the FCC's decision in October: similar pan-European rules may be in the offing. The result could be better internet access for customers—and, just possibly, a step towards the intelligent, self-healing power grid of tomorrow.