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Broadband in gas

By Gearhead, NetworkWorld.com, 07/06/05

Sounds like a tasteless joke doesn't it? But, nope, Broadband in Gas (BiG) is a real technology and a pretty clever one at that.

When we talk about the last mile we always think of telephone and cable but other utilities also enter consumer premises. So far, the one that has attracted all the attention has been electrical power but it seems that signalling over the power grid is a lot trickier than was first thought. So, what does that leave? Howsabout town gas pipes?

The way BiG works is by sending Ultrawideband (UWB) signals down gas pipes at rates of up to 100 Mbps (compare that to fiber which maxs out a around 20 Mbps). Thanks to the laws of physics the metal pipes channel the RF signals around corners and because the valves in natural gas systems are made of plastic, the signals pass through them. Better still is that BiG costs roughly the same as DSL which is about 10% of the cost of fiber. The "Central Office" transceiver can be, conservatively, up to 10km from the customer premises although 100km is thought to be practical.

Interesting stuff. Of course actually getting BiG adopted by the gas companies is a wholly different story -- just shutting down the pipes to install the UWB gear on the scale required is hard to imagine.

To learn more check out Nethercomm and their FAQ. Nethercomm has a very groovy Flash-based Web site which features an equally groovy but incredibly irritating sound loop on every page -- the mute button is that minute icon in the lower left of the screen. Hit it early to avoid grinding your teeth.

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