[HCRA] PROGRESS ENERGY REACHES OUT TO NC HAMS ON BPL

Sun, 09 Nov 2003 16:01:04 +0000

>From an email list I belong to.....

KO1D

PROGRESS ENERGY REACHES OUT TO NC HAMS ON BPL

NORTH Carolina amateurs are getting heard regarding broadband over power 
line Internet delivery by a company whose infrastructure would carry such a 
system. Raleigh, North Carolina-based Progress Energy has responded to many 
calls and e-mails this fall from concerned hams by contacting several local 
Amateur leaders and beginning a dialog that will include Amateur Radio in 
their BPL testing.

IN October, Progress Energy network engineer Bill Godwin met separately with 
Wake County ARES EC Tom Brown, N4TAB, and Gary Pearce, KN4AQ, Wake County 
ARES PIO, and talked by phone with Technical Specialist Frank Lynch, W4FAL. 
Godwin wanted to know more about Amateur Radio, what hams thought 
problematic with BPL, and who in the amateur community he and Progress 
Energy should work with. ARRL North Carolina Section Manager John Covington, 
W4CC, and ARRL Lab Supervisor Ed Hare, W1RFI, were identified as primary 
persons for Progress Energy to work with.

GODWIN set a positive tone by promising that Amateur Radio operators would 
be part of the next phase of testing, to begin early in 2004 in Wake County, 
NC.

GODWIN asked about notch filters. It was explained that notching the ham 
spectrum might work in a limited sense, but it wouldn't protect other 
services like shortwave broadcast listeners, aviation, etc.

PROGRESS Energy completed their Phase I test in the Wakefield area of north 
Raleigh early last summer. Phase I was designed to give Progress Energy 
engineers experience with the hardware, and let them know if it really 
worked. Amateur Radio was not involved in that test, and no Amateur Radio 
interference monitoring was conducted. But they have been hearing from hams 
steadily, and stridently, ever since.

PHASE II is planned for the end of 2003 and early 2004. It will be a larger 
test and focus more on marketing than technology, but hams will be invited 
to participate, and their interest will be technical. Both Phase I and II 
tests involve mostly underground wiring. ARRL Lab Supervisor Ed Hare's 
testing in areas with underground wiring showed that substantial 
interference still occurred, though above ground wiring was worse. Progress 
Energy is testing a system manufactured by Amperion.

MORE information about BPL and Amateur Radio can be found at the ARRL Web 
site at www.arrl.org/tis/info/HTML/plc/

- Thanks to Gary Pearce KN4AQ, Wake County, NC ARES PIO

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