[Elecraft] BPL

Sat Aug 16 06:35:01 2003

The difference in safety is negligible?  I personally know someone whose son
was electrocuted when the antenna he was installing contacted a power line.
I personally know someone who was killed when the light plane he was flying
contacted power lines.  I work in a hospital and see many people maimed or
killed every year when their vehicles collide with power poles.  I had one
of your 7200 volt lines across my front steps after an ice storm last
winter.  I believe the power industry is blind to this issue.

The difference in national security is negligible?  I believe a handful of
terrorists with chain saws and maps to the power grid could bring this
country to its knees!  The damage would be far worse than September 11th.
At any rate, the reason most power lines are underground on continental
Europe is that they have been through two world wars in the last hundred
years.  They understand.

The cost is prohibitive?  I hear this old saw all of the time, but this is
another example of managing for today rather than the long haul.  You,
yourself, said the cost is amortized over 40 years.  During that 40 years my
local power company inspects all the *overhead* lines with a helicopter
every month.  What does it cost to do that for 40 years?  My local power
company sends Davey Tree Service down every street every quarter to prune
the trees off of the overhead lines.  What does it cost to do that for 40
years?  Last winter, we had an ice storm in the western Carolinas and
northern Georgia.  This is a highly industrial and heavily populated area.
Homes and industries were without power for 3 weeks.  The repair costs for
just this one storm was a goodly fraction of a billion dollars.  How many
times will that happen in 40 years?  Now let us mention hurricanes.
Charlotte, North Carolina is 200 miles inland.  After hurricane Hugo, it was
without power for 3 *months* (until Christmas)!  In Charleston, South
Carolina (where the eye came ashore), power was out for weeks or months, but
telephone service (underground) never faltered.  Even at the peak of the
storm.

Having the lines underground would also eliminate the RFI issues with power
lines.  No one would be fighting broadband over power lines, and the power
industry would have yet another source of revenue.

I believe your arguments reveal the shortsighted nature of the management of
today's power companies (Enron?), and I hope the power industry develops a
vision instead of an eye for this quarter's bottom line!

----- Original Message -----
From: "Milt Jensen" <[email protected]>
To: "Dan Allen" <[email protected]>; "Kenneth E. Harker"
<[email protected]>; <[email protected]>
Cc: <[email protected]>; <[email protected]>;
<[email protected]>; <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, August 16, 2003 12:00 AM
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] BPL

> Dan,
>
> Think about what you are saying.  This is unreal as it is not economically
> feasable.
>
> I work for a rural elecectric cooperative (35 years) where I am in charge
of
> the technical services.  One of our services is broadband Internet to our
> members via 2.4 and 5.8 gHz. microwave.  I have advised our general
manager
> that BPL is NOT a feasable method of data delivery in rural areas.
>
> Now to your statement.  At our cooperative we have in excess of 400 miles
of
> overhead line to serve a few more than 2000 meters.  That is about 5
meters
> per mile of line.  We can't afford to put the lines underground.  You do
> know that the users of  the lines have to pay for them, don't you?
>
> At our neighboring cooperative in SW  New Mexico, they have about 1,880
> miles of overhead line to serve nearly 4,800 meters.  You can readily see
> that this is about 2.6 meters per mile.
>
> The cost of putting distribution voltage (7,200 and 14,400 Volts phase to
> ground) line underground in our area is about FOUR times the cost of
> overhead construction.  Single phase OH line costs about $10,000 per mile
in
> open country.  Three phase OH line construction costs are nearly $20,000
per
> mile.  Line cosntruction costs are amortized over a period of 40 years to
> make the cost per kilowatt hour reasonable.
>
> These quoted costs are significantly less than they are in other parts of
> the country due to various reasons.  There is much more cost involved in
any
> lines constructed through State and Federal (BLM and USFS) lands where
both
> environmental and archaeological studies are required to be performed.
> State and Federal lands comprise nearly 90% of the total surface area in
SW
> NM and SE AZ.
>
> The land disturbance of an overhead line is insignificant in comparison
with
> that caused by underground line construction.  I agree that the aesthetic
> result is better with underground construction.  Beyond the distribution
> lines, I really don't think you or any other reasonable person would pay
the
> costs of putting ten of thousands of miles of high voltage transmission
> lines underground.
>
> As to your statement regarding safety and national security, I disagree.
> The difference is neglible in either field.
>
> Regarding interference, the potential is there and certainly is the source
> of much interference.  However, your campaign time and money would be much
> better spent, and in less quantity, by lobbying the FCC to do a better job
> of policing these "unintentional radiators".
>
> As an individual intimately knowledgeable of the construction and
> maintenance techniques of rural electric distribution lines, I can tell
you
> that there is NO problem of RFI from properly constructed lines.  Proper
> maintenance, addressing problems caused by aging, weather, and subsequent
> construction (hanging new transformers for example) will maintain a line
> clean in terms of RFI.
>
> This response is NOT to start a debate.  It is simply the viewpoint of one
> who has been there and done that.
>
> Milt, N5IA
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Dan Allen" <[email protected]>
> To: "Kenneth E. Harker" <[email protected]>; <[email protected]>
> Cc: <[email protected]>; <[email protected]>;
> <[email protected]>; <[email protected]>
> Sent: Friday, August 15, 2003 10:28 AM
> Subject: Re: [Elecraft] BPL
>
>
> > We should also campaign to have *all* power lines placed underground as
> they
> > do in Europe.  This is a safety and national security issue as well as
an
> > interference issue.
> >
> > Dan Allen
> > KB4ZVM
> > K2 S/N 1757
> >
>
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