Technology - Broadband Power Line 4 - BPL Access Systems

Synopsis

We survey the technical principles and performance of major BPL access systems from manufacturers including Motorola, Mitsubishi, Amperion and Current Technologies. We discuss BPL trials, including the actual performance of second generation Mitsubishi equipment, and commercial services including a 256kb/s rural BPL service and some multi-megabit/sec services in urban USA and Europe.

Table of Contents

• 1. Synopsis
• 2. Commercial BPL systems
  • 2.1 Motorola’s Powerline LV
  • 2.2 Current technologies
    • 2.2.1 Separate MV and LV frequencies
    • 2.2.2 HomePlug 1.0 to the home
    • 2.2.3 LV bandwidth limitations
    • 2.2.4 Latency
    • 2.2.5 Neighbours competing for 5Mb/s total bandwidth
  • 2.3 MV with WiFi - Amperion
  • 2.4 Mitsubishi
    • 2.4.1 Time- and Frequency- Division Repeaters
    • 2.4.2 Performance in an above-ground trial
    • 2.4.3 High upstream capacity
    • 2.4.4 DSL rates impractical in large transformer setting
  • 2.5 Sumitomo
  • 2.6 Ambient
  • 2.7 Ilevo
  • 2.8 Ascom
  • 2.9 Corinex
  • 2.10 IBEC
  • 2.11 Main.Net
  • 2.12 E-line Surface Wave Transmission
• 3. Trials and commercial deployment
  • 3.1 Manassas Virginia - Main.Net
  • 3.2 Central Virginia Electric Cooperative - IBEC
• 4. Related reports