Topband: Internet access via power lines reborn in Europe

[Bill Tippett]

        Speaking of RFI, I hope our German subscribers will watch for 
reports of interference from this system.  This is a potentially enormous
market and impact on amateur RFI could be huge if there are problems.  I
excerpted a few portions of the article for those without Web access.

                                                73,  Bill  W4ZV

http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/internet/08/28/power.line.access.idg/index.html

In Mannheim, Germany, local power company MVV Energie AG expects to
connect 3,000 customers to its Internet service by the end of this year. RWE
Powerline expects to connect 2,000 more before the end of the year in its area. 
MVV and RWE offer customers Internet connections at speeds up to 2.5M bps
(bits per second). All a user has to do is connect a modem to a PC using a LAN
or USB (Universal Serial Bus) cable and plug the modem into any electrical
outlet in the home. Pricing for the service ranges from DM29.14 (US$13.11) to
DM249 per month, depending on bandwidth and in some cases how much data
is transmitted. The connection speed isn't guaranteed; all users on a substation
share the bandwidth, comparable to cable Internet access.

The systems made by Main.net use
frequencies between 1MHz and 30MHz to
send data from the home to the local power
substation. From there the data is moved
onto a communications cable that the power
company will have to install.

"There are no more technical problems. The
radiation is under the allowed level, although
radio amateurs aren't happy with us offering
the service," said Andreas Preuss, a spokesman for RWE Powerline GmbH,
which currently offers 400 customers in Essen, Germany, power line Internet
access using Ascom equipment. Despite the radio operators fears, there have
been no reports of radio interference, he said.