Faster HomePlug Power-Line Networking Gear--Finally

HomePlug Alliance members show off first products based on HomePlug AV 200-mbps power-line networking standard.
Yardena Arar, PC World
Thursday, October 05, 2006 05:00 PM PDT


BURLINGAME, California -- Power-line networks--networks that use the existing electrical wiring in your residence or small office--may yet prove the dark horse of home networking technologies.

That's the message emerging from the HomePlug Powerline Alliance's annual technology conference here, which wrapped up today. Taking center stage this year were the first products based on the group's HomePlug AV standard, which was ratified more than a year ago. Promising theoretical throughput of up to 200 megabits per second (and real-world speeds approaching 100 mbps), HomePlug AV will be competing with other technologies as the best way to stream multimedia--specifically, high-definition video--throughout the home.

Competing With Wireless
Power-line networking supporters are hoping to gain traction as people begin to acknowledge wireless networking's limitations for high-bandwidth applications that require quality-of-service features--meaning the ability to prioritize packets so that streamed video or audio plays smoothly. The problems with products based on the first draft of the high-speed 802.11n Wi-Fi standard may also play to power-line networking's advantage.

Due in stores by year's end, the first HomePlug AV products will be simple ethernet adapters, small bricks that plug into an ethernet port on one end and a standard electrical outlet on the other. Setting up a network requires at least two such adapters: one to plug into an Internet-connected router, and another to plug into the ethernet port of whatever device you wish to put on the network.

First AV Products
Zyxel, one of the exhibitors at the HomePlug conference, will be among the first companies to offer HomePlug AV adapters. Product manager Alex Wei says the Zyxel PLA-400 will have a suggested retail price of $99.

Zyxel is also working on a HomePlug AV adapter targeting telephone companies that are gearing up to compete with cable and satellite TV providers. The concept adapter at Zyxel's booth supported both ethernet and coaxial cable, with a small switch to toggle between the two. The idea is that you'd be able to stream incoming video from its point of entry (wherever your phone line comes in) to a HomePlug AV adapter connected to a TV's coaxial input port.

Wei says that in his own informal tests transferring files via FTP, he saw throughput of up to 90 mbps with the HomePlug ethernet adapter.

Competing Technologies
HomePlug AV is not the only power-line technology--in fact, it's the third of three competing technologies promising similar speed, all over existing electrical wires. Panasonic introduced its HD-PLC power-line adapters earlier this year, and Netgear has recently introduced Powerline HD adapters based on the Universal Powerline Association's Digital Home Standard technology from a Spanish company called DS2.

But while HomePlug AV may be late to the power-line party--it was announced in October 2002--neither of its competitors (both of which started out as candidates to become the next-generation HomePlug standard) appear to have as much backing. The HomePlug Powerline Alliance's membership roster includes such high-profile companies as EarthLink, Intel, Linksys (which had prototype products at the HomePlug conference and has promised commercial products by year's end), Motorola, Samsung, and Sony.

The HomePlug Powerline Alliance's conference documents included descriptions of coming HomePlug AV adapters from ActionTec, Delta Electronics, and GigaFast. But the biggest display of products was in the booth of Intellon, a principal contributor to the technology.

Optimized for Video
Presentations at the conference focused on applications that can best benefit from HomePlug AV, almost all of which involved some kind of multimedia streaming: distributing IPTV throughout the home, monitoring for security with video cameras, and networked set-top boxes such as TiVo or Sling Media's SlingBox. In fact, power-line networking is nothing new for some existing SlingBox owners: Sling Media's SlingLinks power-line adapters, accessories that connect SlingBoxes to network routers in homes that do not have ethernet cabling, are based on the original 14-mbps HomePlug 1.0 standard.

Intellon has claimed that HomePlug AV's technology is superior to its power-line competitors in part because it is better able to handle circuit noise resulting from the presence or introduction of other electrical devices on the same circuit as the networked devices.

A demonstration at the Intellon booth sought to prove the claim. It consisted of side-by-side notebooks displaying a couple of video streams, which Intellon said were being transmitted from another notebook over a HomePlug AV network on one system, and either a DS2 or Panasonic HD-PLC network on the other.

The video streams looked great on both displays--until a lamp was plugged into the same power strip. The HomePlug AV video played on uninterrupted, but artifacts appeared on the display showing video streamed over the competing technologies.

The Evolution Of Broadband: Broadband Over Power Lines Takes Another Step Forward !!!

October 6, 2006 • Vol.28 Issue 40
Page(s) 30 in print issue

The Evolution Of Broadband
Broadband Over Power Lines Takes Another Step Forward

Broadband over power lines, or BPL, took one step closer to reality with a recent Memorandum Opinion And Order from the FCC (Federal Communications Commission). But while clearance has been given for operators to offer services, don’t expect to be able to plug into your wall socket and get Internet service any time soon. FCC-approved commercial equipment is just now beginning to become available, so it will be a while before any large-scale deployments roll out.

Several energy companies plan on implementing BPL to improve their overall service reliability. According to Tom Shiel, spokesperson for Duke Energy, “Duke Energy will be using BPL to make our electrical distribution more efficient and reliable through better monitoring down to the transformer level. We expect to take advantage of the two-way communication the smart grid will provide by implementing other applications as we go forward.”

Duke Energy has also been part of several Internet trials around southern Charlotte, N.C. The first test in 2004 involved 500 to 700 homes, while a more recent trial includes up to 6,000 homes using equipment provided by BPL design, development, and marketing firm Ambient (www.ambientcorp.com). This test will help demonstrate the scalability of the technology while measuring reliability.

The Other Side

One of the biggest concerns about BPL is the potential interference with some forms of communication. Amateur radio could potentially experience the most interference due to the unshielded wires used to transmit power over long distances. Because of this, the Amateur Radio Relay League was one of the most vocal opponents to approval of the technology during the FCC’s comment period before issuing the memorandum.

FCC part 15 regulates unlicensed RF devices and will be the specific controlling document with respect to each BPL deployment. The biggest concern of the amateur radio operators is that this won’t be enforced to the level necessary to prevent disruption of their communications.

Moving Forward

The United Power Line Council is an organization with the stated goal of “driving the development of broadband over power line solutions for electric utilities and their partners.” A recently released UTC (United Telecom Council) study titled “Opportunities for Electric Utilities: Broadband over Power Line” listed a number of factors pertinent to BPL and its deployment:

• Smart grid automation and intelligent grid projects will help to demonstrate the viability and usefulness of BPL

• BPL use for in-building networks will increase

• BPL for home networking of communications, computing, and entertainment systems will become available

• BPL as a solution for rural Internet access

Several vendors are providing BPL equipment for testing and early deployment.

CURRENT Communications Group (www.currentgroup.com) has received a number of investments during the past year. It has partnered with several energy companies in early demonstration efforts, including TXU Electric Delivery in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and Duke Energy (formerly Cinergy) in Cincinnati.

Ambient has participated in a number of demonstrations in partnership with Consolidated Edison in New York and Duke Energy in Charlotte. In September, Ambient received a grant of BPL Equipment Authorization from the FCC for its second-generation communication node, also called the X2. This approval allows Ambient to market and install its latest equipment to commercial customers.

With FCC approval should come more real deployments. As the equipment makes its way to the field, the questions of scalability and reliability should be answered. Power companies will be the biggest initial users, as they strive to cut costs and improve their services. Right behind them should be some of the other services mentioned in the UTC study.

by Paul Ferrill Jr.



Companies Offering Broadband Over Power Lines

Company URL Available Products
Ambient www.ambientcorp.com Smart grid; BPL (broadband over power lines)
Arkados www.arkados.com Whole house connectivity
BPL Global www.bplglobal.net Smart grid; BPL
CURRENT Communications Group www.currentgroup.com Smart grid; BPL
Telkonet www.telkonet.com Multidwelling BPL

"Broadband over power lines was once an abstract concept. But, it is now real. Utilities, in fact, are using their current distribution lines ..." !!!

Energy Risk - Broadband's Evolution
Author: Ken Silverstein, EnergyBiz Insider, Editor-in-Chief
Date: 2006-10-05


Broadband over power lines was once an abstract concept. But, it is now real. Utilities, in fact, are using their current distribution lines to not only communicate internally but to also deliver high-speed Internet access to their customers.


Certainly, utilities are focused on their bread and butter enterprises. But, they are in an enviable position: They own the rights-of-way where the fiber that allows for high-speed Internet connections would go. That's fortuitous. The wave of mergers within the telecom sector is a precursor as to who will control the so-called last mile into consumers' homes. Utilities are not necessarily eager to retail telecom services. But, they would certainly lease their limited rights to others who would be all too happy to do the leg work.

"Broadband over power lines (BPL) promises to be the third wire into homes," says Steve Turner, chief operating office of IBEC in Huntsville, Alabama, which manufactures equipment used to provide such high-speed services. "It offers speeds that are comparable to digital subscriber lines and cable modems. And it offers the possibility to turn every power outlet into a channel for high-speed access. His comments came at a conference in Atlanta sponsored by EnerVision, a consulting firm.

According to Turner, 28 percent of all homes have access to high-speed Internet service. But another 31 percent live in locations that are considered too remote for conventional providers of such service while another 14 percent are "waiting" for these features to be sold by some entity. That means 47 million homes are underserved, he says. With their ubiquitous wires, utilities could bridge that divide.

Certainly, the potential is enormous. Telecom Trends International says that BPL revenues will grow from $57 million in 2004 to $4.4 billion in 2011. Right now, digital subscriber lines (DSL) that are provided by telecom carriers and cable modems have made the greatest inroads. But BPL is making its presence known. Already, there are six commercial deployments that include a rural electric cooperative in Virginia and one in south central Indiana. "Rural areas want these services too," says IBEC's Turner.

At the height of the telecom boom around early 2000, about 150 utilities offered telecom services as wholesale providers of capacity. Many have dropped out, like Williams and Dynegy. But others such as Southern Co. have stayed in the game. Even municipal electric companies are participating in the telecom market in some measure because the major players are not enticed to build out. Tacoma Power, the city of Manassas, Virginia and Morristown Utility Systems in Tennessee are three.

During the tech boom of the late 1990s, the marketplace was enamored of companies that could deliver the latest and greatest technologies to homes and businesses. Utilities had longed to shed their stodgy images. They wanted to be viewed as enterprises that had just as much foresight as the tech ventures that were ruling the day. As such, they sought to use their goodwill in the markets they served to offer new products and services.

Digital Living

All told, about 20 percent of the nation's utilities are considering investments in BPL, says New Millennium Research. But power companies don't want to get burned, again. That's why -- in the majority of cases -- they won't make the capital investments in infrastructure and equipment and why they won't actually sell the services to customers.

In most circumstances, utilities serve as "landlords" by leasing space on their wires. The service providers own the equipment and market the product, although customers generally will get their bill from their utility. None of this precludes utilities from vertically integrating high-speed assets and offerings or even from making the needed investments and letting partners provide the service. But, such forays have proved risky in the past and utilities have learned to stick to generating and delivering power.

Utilities have long used low speed technologies to optimize their grids. But, the acceleration of fiber optics has allowed them to place devices along their wires that increase the speeds to deliver data. Through their power substations, they can use couplers along medium voltage power lines that transmit data. A converter is then used to move the signal to a low voltage line that goes into homes. Once inside, a BPL modem is used to provide high-speed access from any electrical outlet.

There are some delivery issues. Emergency responders have expressed concerns that BPL signals might interfere with the government's ability to deliver care during times of crisis. That's why the Federal Communications Commission has issued rules that became effective in July that mandate all equipment be made so as not to cloud communications. Existing gear, however, is grandfathered.

Other concerns: electrical wires are noisy and impede data transmissions. That means that Internet traffic must adapt. But, companies are working on this by developing more advanced couplers.

Without a doubt, BPL ventures pose a lot of risks. The fallout from the telecom bust in the 2001 time period still reverberates. But, the key to winning the broadband wars is controlling the lines into homes and possibly the customers themselves. All players want to provide bundled services such as voice, data and cable. If utilities choose to participate, the object would be to expand those services to include advanced home monitoring as well as technologies that interact with smart appliances.

The opportunities are especially appealing for rural electric cooperatives. At least half of their members -- customers -- say that they trust their management more than they do their phone or cable companies, says IBEC's Turner. Besides that loyalty, they are a captive market that is trying to boost job growth. Without high-speed Internet services, they will not have the underlying infrastructure they need to economically develop.

Technology is indisputably going to change rapidly over the next 10 years. The extent of broadband's evolution is pure guesswork. Still, there are certain factors that are known. Chief among them is that the cable and copper wire are the only services that are prevalent and that lead directly into consumers' homes. And while they are capital-intensive technologies, they are still cost effective when compared to others that are immediately available. The evolution, though, is ongoing. And, there's room for new ideas and new players -- a role that some utilities think they can play.

HomePlug Proponents Argue For Simplicity

By Natali T. Del Conte
10.05.06

Members of the Broadband over Power Lines (BPL) industry said Wednesday that the technology needs to be simplified and more accessible to an audience.

BPL enthusiasts met at the HomePlug Technology Conference, which governs the standards for communications, including broadband Internet, over traditional power lines.

"We expect to see HomePlug directly supporting or installed in over 100 million products by 2010," said Carl Mansfield, senior manager of networking technologies for Sharp Labs of America. "What we expect is that consumer devices will need a number of different connectivity options. Over time various applications will converge through mutual functionality through interoperability in communications paths. HomePlug gives consumers options, which is what they want."

Setting up the technology leaves something to be desired, however.



"The other day my neighbor told me about setting up his wireless system and he was so excited that it worked because he expected it not to," said Craig Cahill, senior manager of worldwide business development for Cisco-Linksys Corporation. "The industry has to work on its interface so that people have more faith in the system."

Content, not technology, is what will ultimately drive consumers to HomePlug. Kevin Gage, senior vice president of content strategy and digital media for NBC Universal, gave the keynote address on Wednesday morning, discussing the ways that content has evolved due to broadband technology.

"You can download a King Kong movie in 80 minutes," Gage said. "In 1985 it would have taken three years to download a DVD quality movie of King Kong. In a few years it will take less than 10 minutes."

Downloading capabilities make consumers more demanding and articulate about online content and its delivery format.

"Wireless gives us freedom and that is creating what we call a pull customer," Gage said. "A pull customer doesn't have to watch what is being fed to them. They're deciding when and where they want to watch their content."

Gage estimated that 26 million people will be watching video content on portable devices by 2009 and will demand to interact with the content that they download. Last year TV game show "Deal or No Deal" received 50 million votes per episode in its first year on the air. When compared with the 1 percent participation that "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire" received five years ago, the message is clear that consumers want to immerse into their content, not just consume it, he said.

But connectivity still has to be simplified. Consumers don't have enough understanding of BPL and they are afraid to deploy it in their homes. Cahill said that Cisco will make announcements in January at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) that will help solve the interface enigma. Content providers such as Comcast are on board and the hardware is in place, he said. The consumer is the only missing link at this juncture.

"Right now we develop products and then we find a way to take it to market. I think from the evolution of the consumer space, we really have to look at what is driving the demand and then develop the products around that," Cahill said.

As BPL and other broadband systems gain momentum, services such as VoIP, digital home security, and IPTV can also expect increased adoption. Radomir Jovanovic, president and chief executive officer for SPiDCOM, predicted that there will be 63 million IPTV subscribers worldwide by 2010, although the phenomenon has seen growth restricted to Europe and the U.S., and very little in Asia and South America.

The HomePlug Technology Conference runs through Thursday in Burlingame.

Corinex MV Access Gateway Awarded FCC Part 15G Certification

October 04, 2006 07:00 AM Eastern Time


HOUSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Corinex Communications Corp. was awarded FCC Part 15G certification on its MV Access Gateway, FCC ID: QIU-CXP-MVA-GWY. The FCC certification gives Corinex customers the ability to fully comply with all FCC regulations while still being able to deploy the fastest Broadband over Powerline (BPL) Access systems in the world.

BPL delivers a complete communications system on a utilities Medium and Low voltage electric lines. The technology allows utilities and operators to offer revenue generating Broadband solutions and cost optimizing Intelligent Grid applications over their existing power grid.

“Corinex is proud to be able to offer the worlds only FCC certified 200Mbps BPL Access solution, shipping in volume,” said Peter Sobotka, Corinex CEO. “FCC certification further demonstrates Corinex’s commitment to adhering to worldwide standards for our large global customer base,” added Sobotka.

The certification testing process was conducted at several locations at CenterPoint Energy in Houston, Texas under some of the harshest conditions for noise and customer density. Certifying under such difficult conditions ensures that Corinex customers deploying in noisy or clean environments will have equipment that functions flawlessly.

The Corinex MV Access Gateway also won a nomination for the International Engineering Consortiums (IEC) InfoVision Awards, which will be presented at the Broadband World Forum Europe in Paris on October 9-12. The awards recognize the “Top Innovations in Broadband”. Corinex’s MV Access Gateway was nominated as the only Broadband over Powerline (BPL) technology in the “Best Access Network Technologies and Services” category, along with products from BT, Ericsson AB, ICI, JDSU, Tellabs, Thomson and others.

EarthLink to offer internet to 6,000 DUKE ENERGY and Ambient Corp. Broadband over Power Line`s customers !!!

Duke to open commercial trial with Ambient gear
October 3, 2006


EarthLink to offer internet to 6,000



Duke Energy recently started building the next phase of its master BPL plan -- a commercial trial using Ambient's latest access BPL gear.

The utility for years has been slowly following a plan of phased deployments starting with technology trials that began several years ago.

The latest technology trials at Duke, one of the largest IOUs in the US, included technology from Ambient and Current Technologies.

Previous trials included Mitsubishi -- a relationship that ended recently, reported the Charlotte (NC) Business Journal (http://tinyurl.com/rb4gl).

The Ambient gear was shown on a tour during the UPLC's annual BPL conference in Charlotte two weeks ago.

Duke Energy headquarters are in Charlotte.

The utility sees a bright future for BPL at Duke and throughout the utility industry, Sandra Meyer sees told the audience at the UPLC event.

She's Duke's group vice president of customer service sales and marketing.

The utility believes building, owning and running the network is the best approach, she reported.

Some BPL technology firms may be counting on taking on some of those responsibilities but not Ambient, the technology firm's CEO John Joyce told us Friday.

The Newton, Mass, firm is comfortable with as much or little involvement in each deployment as the utility needs or wants.

Ambient learned from its work with Duke, fine tuned its technology and developed a network management software system that Duke will license.

Duke's decision to go to the commercial phase with Ambient gear is significant -- for Ambient and for the industry, Joyce reported.

One reason Ambient chose to work with Duke in 2005 was that the utility is a seen as a leader in the BPL world, he added.

"Everyone recognizes that.

"They've had a dedicated staff working on BPL, working on business models with BPL, working with the regulators in the various states" where the utility operates and in helping to set the standards, Joyce noted.

Duke is a full member of the UPLC with membership on its board.

It's a member of the HomePlug Powerline Alliance and the UPA and represents the interests of utilities and other BPL users in the IEEE standards efforts (more on that below).

Duke's commitment to BPL has been longstanding and its approach to deploying the technology measured.

Some might call it slow.

Caution is not only typical of the utilities -- an industry that deals with a dangerous product and sometimes costly technology mistakes -- but such diligence at a pioneering firm may be best for the BPL industry.

Ambient gets it.

"We believe that Duke's cautious and rigorous approach to validating our BPL technology prior to this initial deployment further strengthens the credibility of the BPL industry," Joyce told the press last week.

"We've had a number of conversations especially last week down in Charlotte with other utilities that are very much interested in understanding the Duke process," said Joyce.

Duke's progress "puts the whole industry in a different light," he added.

Once the network is built and the homes passed, EarthLink will offer broadband in this deployment, said Joyce.

The household-name ISP is actively looking for such opportunities (BT, 9/19).



Ambient's DS2 edge



We asked Joyce and Ambient's Chief Network Architect Ram Rao about regeneration versus repeating.

We realized the importance of the difference when reporting plans at IBEC and Utility.net (BT, 9/26).

For the sake of clarity -- although we believe these definitions aren't exactly official -- repeating a BPL signal repeats the noise and thus leads to degradation of the content.

Regeneration decodes the signal and recodes it, thus filtering out the noise and creating a signal that can be sent further down the lines.

Repeating is done on the "physical" layer of the network, noted Rao, also called the PHY layer.

But repeating using a higher layer such as layer two -- the data layer or the networking layer means unpacking the data then repacking it and reestablishing a signal, he added.

"That's typically what we do with the DS2-type technology."

But a further distinction exists, said Rao.

Regeneration can be further subdivided into time domain and frequency domain.

Both are available on the DS2 chipset and Rao believes that's not true with HomePlug 1.0 or Turbo chipsets.

Time and frequency domains can be chosen on any DS2 chip and switched remotely.

"The ability to distinguish between time domain and frequency domain is something we've actually been practicing in the field at the Duke installation," noted Joyce.

"It provides a lot of flexibility in the network design and what you are trying to achieve for a cost benefit -- the cost of the equipment versus bandwidth availability," Rao added.

Time domain repeating uses a single chip while frequency domain requires two chips to handle the data, one on the upstream side of the data and the other for the downstream side.

"You can get more bandwidth typically from a frequency domain than a time domain," he added.

Time domain uses all the frequencies at once and thus can only send data one way at a time.

The frequency domain's use of multiple frequencies independently frees up bandwidth but takes more chips, thus takes a larger investment in hardware.

A typical approach is to use a mix -- taking advantage of the savings from time domain repeating in areas where bandwidth is less of an issue, explained Rao.

When lots of new customers sign up on a segment of the network or more bandwidth is needed for whatever reason, switching to frequency modulation may require adding some nodes along the network but will effectively deliver the added bandwidth.

The ability to use both time and frequency offers scalability and flexibility, noted Joyce.

Ambient calls it a "smart build approach."

We reported assertions from another BPL technology firm that the impedance matching on its couplers gives its gear a cleaner signal.

Do Ambient's couplers do that?

All BPL gear has to accomplish impedance matching if it's going to hook to the grid, noted Rao.



It's outside the box



We noticed during the Duke tour that Ambient's node for underground LV lines installs in a separate metal box attached to the outside of the utility's pad-mount transformer box.

We asked the line-workers at the site and they confirmed the external box takes a bit longer to install than BPL gear attached on the inside of the transformer box.

The outside installation is optional, Rao told us last week.

Some prefer the outside installation so a technician that's not necessarily a line-worker can do maintenance on the BPL gear.

The couplers go inside the transformer box, he reminded.



Entire circuits lit



Any utility can fairly easily pass 100 homes with BPL -- but lighting up an entire circuit is a different story, Rao told us Friday.

Ambient's lighting up three, he added.

The zip codes covered in the expanded deployment -- as seen in the FCC-ordered BPL database -- cover much more than 6,000 homes.

That doesn't suggest Duke's future plans but does give a sense of the scale of the expansion (www.ambientcorp.com).

Morgan Stanley: Broadband over Power Line`s (BPL) the answer to energy ills

October 3, 2006

New Ambient Corp. Patent: Protecting medium voltage inductive coupled device from electrical transients

United States Patent 7,116,007
Cern October 3, 2006

-----
Protecting medium voltage inductive coupled device from electrical transients


Abstract
There is provided a method for protecting loads associated with power distribution system inductive signal couplers. The method includes (a) providing an inductive signal coupler having a first winding in series with a line conductor of a power distribution system, a second winding having a terminal, and a magnetic core for coupling a signal between the first winding and the second winding, (b) situating a layer of electrical insulation between the second winding and the magnetic core, and (c) connecting the terminal to an electrical ground so that a voltage between the magnetic core and the electrical ground is placed across the layer of electrical insulation. There is also provided an inductive signal coupler having (a) a winding in series with a line conductor of a power distribution system, and (b) a conductive plate at an end of the coupler distal from the first winding, for routing a flashover current to an electrical ground.


-------
Inventors: Cern; Yehuda (Brookline, MA)
Assignee: Ambient Corporation (Newton, MA)

Appl. No.: 10/388,115
Filed: March 13, 2003

UPA´s Digital Home Standard breaking new ground with high-speed Powerline Communications products

Cannes, France – 26th September, 2006 – “High-speed products developed to the UPA Digital Home Standard (DHS) specification deliver what consumers and service providers want - secure, easy to use, reliable networking products that are scalable to support and deliver the multimedia high-bandwidth applications that are coming into vogue today such as head to head gaming or HDTV”, stated, Victor Dominguez, Director of Standards and Strategy at leading PLC chip provider DS2 who represented the Universal Powerline Association Presidency at the head-to-head standards session during the Net-at-Home conference taking place in Cannes today.


Mr Dominguez explained that, “new generation high speed powerline products developed to the UPA DHS standard mark a turning point for the powerline communications industry. Today 12 differentiated interoperable high-speed powerline products are available from over eight companies for the service provider market and home networking products are now also in retail stores. This is proof positive of an emerging market, of industry commitment and it marks a turning point for the PLC industry. UPA standards are putting PLC on the map as a multimedia networking technology”.


Commenting on the array of parallel standards initiatives, Mr Dominguez stated that, “PLC applications in the home networking market used to be about about the delivery of data. Existing standards for this sector of the industry do not support the market demand for multimedia applications. Some organizations are scrambling to rework their old standards but you can’t fit a square peg into a round hole. For PLC to be an alternative network technology today and in the future one must develop with multimedia in mind from the start”. “This is the strength of the UPA DHS standard and the reason why so many companies already have high speed 200 Mbps product on the market under the UPA label”, he added.


The UPA DHS specification provides for compatibility with non-UPA technologies by means of a co-existence mechanism. UPA has been proposing the coexistence concept as necessity to bridge the various powerline communities and applications since 2005. UPA has been working with the organization CEPCA to develop a joint proposal that is now in ETSI. UPA is also represented at the IEEE powerline initiative where the coexistence requirements proposal is due for ratification. The UPA coexistence mechanism is a unique feature that guarantees that future versions of UPA technology will be compatible with today’s specifications. Mr Dominguez added, “no one wants to throw good money after bad, everyone - consumers, service providers and equipment providers want to invest in developing a winning solution and the UPA label provides the comfort that one is investing in a scalable business or home network that is built to last”.

About DS2: www.ds2.es

DUKE ENERGY dumps Mitsubishi Electric Power Products for a small New England company to pilot its *Broadband over Power Lines

Duke switches vendors on broadband venture
Utility contracts with New England firm, ends deal with Mitsubishi
Charlotte Business Journal - September 29, 2006
by John Downey- Senior Staff Writer

Duke Energy Carolinas has ended a two-year project with one of Japan's largest broadband equipment companies, turning to a small New England company to pilot its broadband service over power lines.

Duke spokesman Tom Shiel declines to say why Duke ended its relationship with Mitsubishi Electric Power Products. Duke started its broadband program with Mitsubishi in 2004. But that project was never able to get beyond a 500-home trial.

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