ohohlfeld.com : blog
I was reading the 1/2008 (March) issue of EURESCOM mess@ge covering The Future Internet today. An article by Milon Gupta introduced the OMEGA project, which is running from 2008 to 2010 and focuses on “Gigabit speed at home without cable clutter”. The project is motivated by the fact that the home network could become the bottleneck in the future, high-speed Internet, as “many devices are limited to wireless transmission rates of 54 megabit per second, or require troublesome wiring to achieve higher rates”. The article proposes the following solution to install comfortable, high-speed home networks: “OMEGA will overcome these limitations by increasing the speed to one gigabit per second and by connecting home devices to the Internet and to each other through power line communications and wireless connections”.
Power line is a technique where, roughly speaking, data is transmitted using electric power lines instead of dedicated but more appropriate network cables. This approach is comfortable as a network of power lines is already installed in today’s homes and devices can be plugged in everywhere to get connectivity without worrying about running network cables. However, using power lines as carrier for wideband signals, such as high-speed network communiction, is a questionable approach as power lines are untwisted and unshielded and thus form a large antenna which will radiate the signals sent over power lines. Therefore, there is a high potential for interfering other radio services or being interfered. Power line communication can make HF Radio services–allowing world-wide communication and thus invaluable services such as emergency networks–unusable. Is it really worth loosing an invaluable resource just to send data using inappropriate wires? More information can be found here:
- “Broadband Over Powerline (BPL) and Amateur Radio” by the American Radio Relay League. A good article covering many details about why amateur radio is concerned about the deployment of BPL.
- “The effects of power-line telecommunications on broadcast reception” by BBC research.
- “Video and Audio recordings of BPL Interference“
- “Track and Solve Electrical Interference“
- “Wireless Institute of Australia review of Power Line Communications (PLC) / Broadband over Power Lines (BPL) in Australia” stating that “from all observations to radiate electromagnetic energy of such intensity that it will substantially interfere with not just Amateur Radio, but all HF and low VHF radiocommunications”
- BPL Flyer by the Wireless Institute of Australia
- “Power line : Potential for Interference“
Is sending wideband signals over untwisted and unshielded wires really the highest of highs in electrical engineering? Maybe research should think about alternatives without suggesting to deploy the next best but inappropriate solution?
PS: Does this highlight the need to revisit the song released by the Buggles in 1979 entitled Video Killed the Radio Star?
