Hydro-Québec in Canada to test internet over power lines

November 25, 2003

While
ADSL, Satellite, Cable and Wi-Fi broadband are the most popular ways of offering
broadband to consumers without installing new cabling, there
is another approach being tested over a connection that nearly everyone is
guaranteed to have - The AC power line.
Hydro-Québec in Montreal plans on offering its
customers access to broadband over their existing power cables to compete with
cable and telephone services. Some
experts predict that this approach may offer up to five times faster throughput
than a high-speed cable TV connection.

Installation is fairly cheap as the lines are already in place and
'access-points' can be any electrical outlet in the home 😉 It is just a matter of plugging in the
PC and the special power-outlet modem and you are online. There has been some concern about
interference for those who also use their electrical cabling for television
reception, but it has been pointed out that these two services can run
simultaneously over the same power-line without any issues. Hydro-Québec expects to start testing
this service in January.

MONTREAL - Hydro-Québec is planning to offer high-speed internet
service over its power lines to compete with similar services from cable
and telephone companies.

The utility already uses
signals over its power lines to control stoplights, but now it wants to
adapt it to offer internet access.

Some experts say such a
service could be up to five times faster than high-speed cable internet
service.

Jim Carroll, author of
"Surviving the Information Age," said the addition of the new service
could be great for consumers.

"If we have that many
participants in the broadband marketplace then the real impact is perhaps
it's going to help to keep prices down or drive down the monthly price,"
said Carroll.

Jean-Paul Galarneau, of the
Quebec cable company Vidéotron, said its service will stand up to the
competition.

"Videotron has to compete
with satellite, we're doing pretty well today, and we're ready to fight
with any competitor," said Galarneau.

But some broadcasters use
electrical wires as antennas for radio signals and are concerned that the
internet signals could interfere with radio and television reception.

Broadcast expert Jacques
Bouliane said the internet signal could completely ruin television
reception.

"Even if you don't subscribe
to the service, you would get interference from it," he said.

Hydro said it won't be a
problem, and pointed out that interference doesn't occur over cables that
provide both television and internet service.

German utilities company RWE
started offering Internet service over power lines the summer of 2001, but
went out of the business in 2002. Scottish Hydro-Electric offers broadband
Internet service over its power lines.

Canadian tech company Nortel
ran tests of the technology in Britain in the late 1990s and concluded
that it would be far too expensive to adapt power grids to carry internet
signals.

Hydro-Québec said it will
start testing the service in January and hopes to offer the service in a
few years.

If this broadband approach proves popular, it could mean the end of being
too far away from a cable/ADSL ISP to access broadband. All the Electricity Company needs to do
is add a repeater every few miles at transformers without the worry of adding
new costly lengthy cables. It would
be nice if this approach would be perfected for carrying telephone and cable TV
channels also as this would mean the end of constantly digging up the streets
just to add more cabling to houses that already have a power-line. It would also be handy to be able to
plug the TV and telephone into any outlet without worrying about extra cables
and sockets.

It may
be just another few years before nearly every house has access to broadband in
some fashion. It looks like the
movie industry may even exploit this and could make optical video discs obsolete in the next few years. For
example, if a country decided to upgrade its entire electrical grid to be
broadband enabled, then streaming based movie rentals or even movie purchases
can be made available to anyone with a compatible player and a regular household
electrical outlet to plug it in to.
Unfortunately, fair-use backups may even be ruled out as there is no
physical media to get lost, damaged or worn out.

Source: CBC News Canada