Broadband Internet over power lines could take off in 2005, experts say
More than 50% of U.S. households have adopted broadband Internet access and that percentage could grow even more if the futuristic technology of delivering broadband access over power lines develops as quickly as some advocates expect.
The technology is poised to take off this year, with more than 20 projects in operation at year-end 2004 and more expected to come online this year, Allen Hepner, executive director of the New Millennium Research Council, said yesterday during a conference call to discuss the results of the council’s study on broadband over power line technology.
“During the past two years, the commercial and media perspectives on BPL in the United States have evolved from categorizing the technology as ‘almost ready’ to ‘really here,’” he says, adding that broadband over power line technology already is available in sections of New York City and Manassas, Va.
The spread of broadband Internet access has implications in the e-retailing industry because broadband users shop and buy more often online than dial-up users.
Recent surveys by Harris Interactive indicate that there is “significant consumer interest” in broadband over power line, says Barry Goodstadt, Harris Interactive vice president and senior consultant. “At approximately $30 a month, we would expect to see about 13 million households adopting this service,” assuming it is delivered in a reasonable amount of time and of a quality similar to cable and telecommunications offerings, he says.
Joseph E. Fergus, president and CEO of Communications (COMTek), says the company in January had a waiting list of 1,200 people wanting broadband over power line service. COMTek in Manassas launched the first citywide commercial broadband over power line in the U.S. “The BPL industry is still very young, but it is finally moving beyond the theoretical state to the real thing,” he says.
But one observer says broadband over power line still faces obstacles. “There have been a number of experiences in England and Germany which essentially have been shut down,” says Robert Olsen, professor of electrical engineering at Washington State University. “The experience in Europe has been more mixed. In the U.S., too, there are examples of systems that have been shut down or utilities that have not decided to go into the business,” he says.
Olsen also warns that the Federal Communications Commission prohibits broadband over power line operators from causing “harmful interference” to licensed users of the same electromagnetic spectrum, but has yet to define the term. “That’s the wild card,” he says.
Back...
