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 Previous: The Amateur Radio Crossword Puzzler |  Next: FCC Amateur Radio Enforcement Letters for the Period Ending Mar 6, 2004 |
 FCC Chairman Michael Powell takes a firsthand look at a BPL-provided Internet connection in the home of Bud Howard in Fuquay-Varina, North Carolina. EarthLink is marketing the service. |
NEWINGTON, CT, Mar 9, 2004--A Broadband over Power Line (BPL) home demonstration in the Raleigh, North Carolina, area March 5 provided an ideal opportunity for area amateurs to take their concerns to FCC Chairman Michael Powell face to face. While ARRL Public Information Officer Gary Pearce, KN4AQ, doesn't believe his brief encounter with the FCC head and longer discussions with Commission and electric utility staffers will stop or slow the seeming BPL juggernaut, they were valuable nonetheless.
"We consider the day successful in the context that we were able to speak directly with several high-level FCC officials, key Progress Energy officials and the CEO of Amperion--a BPL provider," Pearce said. "Long-term success will be measured by how much of a problem BPL poses to Amateur Radio, or how much of a problem is avoided."
While Pearce says he spent all of about 30 seconds with Powell, he did manage to tell the chairman that amateurs believe BPL's interference potential is being understated and would be more difficult to resolve than the FCC suggested in its BPL Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM).
"What I didn't know
when I talked to him," he added, "was that a question that we had sent to the
local newspaper had been posed earlier in the day at a press conference about
interference, and he had already answered that question, so he was somewhat
tuned into the idea."
 While a reporter shoots a photo, Progress Energy Director of Emerging Technologies Matt Oja points to a diagram of the BPL trial area south of Raleigh as FCC Chairman Michael Powell (left), FCC Chief of Policy Development Bob Pepper (center), Amperion Chairman and CEO Phillip Hunt and an unidentified Progress Energy employee look on. |
As the Raleigh News & Observer reported, Powell responded to the question by saying the FCC would not let BPL interfere with critical services. "The question is whether it does, and to what extent, and what limits can be placed to make sure it doesn't," Powell said. "We've been fully committed to only allowing things with the range of what we're convinced won't create impermissible interference."
But Powell went on to say that if BPL can provide broadband access anywhere there's a power outlet, "We're not going to be easily dissuaded from doing something that has that much potential."
Electric utility Progress Energy and BPL partner Amperion now are operating three field test sites in Wake County south of Raleigh. Acting on a tip, Pearce and several other area amateurs--ARRL Technical Specialist Frank Lynch, W4FAL, among them--showed up at the prearranged BPL demonstration at a private residence in Fuquay-Varina. "They were kind of worried that we were going to sit in front of the demonstration with a high-powered mobile and disrupt it," Pearce said of the FCC and industry officials. "We didn't do that, but certainly hams have talked about doing things like that." His approach to getting Amateur Radio's side heard has entailed being respectful and behaving like adults, Pearce said. But he also acknowledged that many amateurs are upset and angry, and more than a few would prefer a more aggressive stance.
While Pearce witnessed the demo inside, other members of the amateur delegation, among them Wake County ARRL Emergency Coordinator Tom Brown, N4TAB--an engineer--chatted with Powell Senior Legal Advisor Chris Libertelli.
"He was informative and courteous and openly sought our views," Brown said. "He received them in kind." He said Libertelli told the group that the Raleigh area had caught Washington's attention and seemed to be the only place in the country where there was any real cooperation between hams and utilities promoting BPL.
Brown said the "outside" delegation again raised the amateurs' belief that BPL industry claims are misstated and wrong. "The point was made," he said. "Overall I think we were successful in illuminating a few issues and opening more doors instead of closing them."
For his part, Pearce said, the event reinforced his opinion that BPL is "a serious, big business-government venture in which Amateur Radio is, for now, a minor annoyance. "Everyone is relying on the vendors' claims that their technology can solve all the problems," he said.
A few hams--most a half-mile or so away from the field
test sites--already have identified some weak interference from BPL on 10 and
12 meters, Pearce told ARRL. "There are hams who live in the vicinity who hear
the [BPL] signals, and if they chose to operate on the bands where this stuff
is, then they'd have to be listening to it."
 As a Progress Energy line worker stands by, Amperion CEO Hunt (left) shows the BPL entry-point equipment to Powell, Pepper, and Oja. |
Pearce said he was unsuccessful in getting FCC Chief of Policy Development Bob Pepper or Powell to take a quick spin in his mobile radio-equipped vehicle to show him what BPL sounded like "from our perspective." The FCC officials declined, due to time constraints but suggested instead that the amateurs arrange a similar demonstration in Washington.
From what he and his amateur cohorts have observed, Pearce predicted that BPL could blanket a full one-mile diameter area with interference to the average home amateur station. "It would be very irritating," he said.
Pearce and Brown agree that BPL is not technologically mature enough to ensure the sort of "interference mitigation" the FCC envisions in its NPRM. Brown says his engineering instincts are raising a lot of red flags.
"It's being portrayed as being an easy, on-the-fly, 'hey, we just push a button, and it happens' kind of thing. I don't believe that's the case," Brown said. "The Achilles' heel of this whole thing is mitigation, obviously--it's enforcement." Brown believes human intervention will be inevitable to resolve interference complaints.
"It's not anywhere near as adaptive as they would lead you to believe it is or want you to--by absence of further information--allow you to delude yourself," he said. "It's not there yet."
Pearce said he was happy to get just a few seconds with Powell and to be able to put "a human face" on Amateur Radio's side of the issue.
"We know they heard us and that we made a good impression," he said. "We hope it was a deep one as well."
Brown was more guarded, characterizing the encounter as "one of those things that mattered but didn't make a difference."
"This thing is
on a downhill track, it's got a lot of energy behind it, it's got a lot of mass
behind it, and it's got a low-friction rail," he said. "And we're not going to
stop it. It's going to happen."
| Previous: The Amateur Radio Crossword Puzzler | Next: FCC Amateur Radio Enforcement Letters for the Period Ending Mar 6, 2004 |
