David95037
join:2003-04-16
Morgan Hill, CA
 ·Be There
| BPL - The Wave Report comments
The Wave Report is a highly influential newsletter that has an uncanny knack of finding the real story behind the PR spin. They have been following the BPL issue closely with a number of insightful comments.
A brief extract from their latest newsletter on the NOI and the FCC's thinking is below;
More information is here;
»www.wave-report.com/other-html-f···ine3.htm
Full details on the Wave report are here;
»www.wave-report.com
»www.3dlinks.com/
***Broadband over Power Line FCC NOI Update
By James Sneeringer
(July 9)
The FCC Office of Engineering and Technology (OET) opened a Notice of Inquiry into broadband over power line (BPL) access technology earlier this year, with special attention paid to possible interference issues.
Today at the WCA 2003 conference in Washington, DC, the WAVE Report spoke with Alan Scrime, Chief
of the Policy and Rules Division of the OET, concerning the progress of the NOI. Alan made several points:
- The comments period just ended on July 8, and the total number of comments was almost 2000.
- Amateur radio enthusiasts were very active in submitting comments, detailing concerns they have over possible interference from BPL access systems.
- The comment period is over now, and the reply comment period will end on August 6.
- The FCC should have something from this NOI to the public by about the end of the year. However, the timing is dependent on the Commissioners' schedule, and so there are no promises made.
- The OET and FCC in general are excited by the possibility of BPL access as a competitive consumer broadband service. But, they have a clear duty to protect incumbent users of the spectrum utilized by BPL access services. The commission will do as much as it can to encourage this technology and industry--within the bounds of conservative assessments of its impacts on existing spectrum users.
The WAVE Report site contains a tutorial on the BPL NOI written by James Stenger, a telecommunications attorney who works within the BPL industry. The address is:
»www.wave-report.com/tutorials/bpl.htm
The amateur radio's response to the NOI has been organized by the ARRL (American Radio Relay League), the national association for amateur radio. The ARRL filed a 120 page comments document with the FCC asking that BPL not be allowed to go forward. The filing can be found on the ARRL web site:
»www.arrl.org/announce/regulatory/et03-104/
Broadband over powerline is a technology that uses electric power distribution wires to carry a high-frequency data signal. In- home powerline data communications use the power lines inside a house to create a local area network. They are commercially available and standardized under the HomePlug Powerline Alliance.
BPL access technology uses outside electric distribution lines to deliver a broadband signal to homes. At least five vendors have trial deployments of BPL access technology with electric utilities in the US and around the world. |
