NY Sluggish on BPL Uptake

Despite two years of testing, New York is still studying the prospects of broadband over power lines.
February 20, 2006

‘The ability to better manage the utility grid system will be the driving force that will push this industry to significant commercialization in 2006.’

-John Joyce,

Ambient

With a number of public utilities across the United States deploying broadband over power lines, New York State, one of the first to consider the technology, is still studying it.



New York’s Public Service Commission (PSC) is seeking input from the small community of BPL vendors and others on the service, which would offer Internet access to power customers via their electrical outlets in the home (see Motorola Plans BPL Hybrid and IBM Jump-starts BPL Market).



The technology would also add intelligence to the electricity grid in the state, making it capable of reducing outages and allowing automatic meter reading.



The commission’s study runs parallel to two active trial deployments of BPL in New York State. Development-stage startup Ambient is partnering with Consolidated Edison, the New York City-based utility, to test the technology in Briarcliff Manor, New York, as well as parts of Manhattan and Orange County (see U.S. City Lights up BPL).

New Visions Powerline Communications, a Syracuse, New York startup, has deployed BPL technology in Solvay, New York. A test deployment in Penn Yan, New York, managed by Data Ventures, was discontinued in June 2005 (see BPL Lights Texas).



Offering BPL services in a state that includes some of the most densely populated urban and suburban areas in the U.S. raises a number of ticklish questions.



Safety and potential interference with other systems are two of the primary questions involved in deploying the technology within the state’s extensive grid of overhead and underground distribution facilities (see Shock Radio for BPL Firm).



But BPL promises to enhance the delivery of electricity across the state because it transforms the electricity grid into an intelligent network that can be used to monitor and manage the grid for outages, usage, and potential trouble situations (see Current Readies Voice over BPL).



The potential benefits of BPL have not been a question. The utilities, BPL equipment vendors, services companies, along with the state commissions, all agree that BPL will greatly enhance the transmission, distribution, reliability, and quality of power service.



It will also make manual meter reading, with its potential for errors, a thing of the past.



“The ability to better manage the utility grid system will be the driving force that will push this industry to significant commercialization in 2006, not necessarily for delivering broadband to the masses,” said John Joyce, chief executive of Ambient.



Broadband Reluctance

Deregulation of public utilities in the early 1990s freed many of them to begin investing in other businesses, and a number of them chose telecommunications.



But the telecommunications industry went through one of its more wrenching evolutions in the late 1990s after the passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, and many of the utilities failed at the telecommunications business.



Some believe those failures have contributed heavily to a general reluctance by utility firms to embrace BPL.



“Even though BPL will help the utilities improve and manage their assets, they have not been aggressively pursuing the opportunity, until recently,” said Mr. Joyce. “Most of them are now focusing on the intelligent grid rather than the broadband part of the investment.”



The PSC recognizes the general reluctance of utilities to act so the commission has made a point of minimizing its oversight and regulation of the technology.



The commission said its concerns are limited to the use of existing utility personnel to support commercial BPL deployments, along with costs incurred by the deployment and access.



The commission has also advised the state’s utilities that they should farm out the management of any commercial BPL business to specialists such as EarthLink. The Atlanta-based ISP has been one of a handful of major firms to focus on the still-emerging service.



Competing with the glut of broadband services marketed to the home such as cable, DSL, and wireless could prove to be a challenge, although the initial pricing of BPL Internet access has been under $30, which is quite competitive with DSL and less expensive than cable.



There are two commercial deployments of BPL in the U.S.—one in Cincinnati, Ohio, and another in Manassas, Virginia. The Cincinnati deployment is managed by Current Communications of Germantown, Maryland, while the Manassas network is run by Communication Technologies, of Chantilly, Virginia.