CABLE AND ILECs DIFFER ON BROADBAND-OVER-POWER-LINE DEPLOYMENT

The FCC’s inquiry into technical issues of providing broadband over power lines (BPL) drew largely predictable responses from key players that faced potential competition from the nascent technology and those that had possible interference concerns: (1) Cable was worried about reasonable access and rates for poles owned by utilities. (2) Telephone companies called for uniform regulatory treatment of all broadband providers. (3) Broadcasters urged the Commission to ensure there was no interference for over- the-air broadcast stations signals, including DTV stations. (4) Utilities said existing rules for carrier current systems provided adequate protection against interference.

In announcing the inquiry April 23, the FCC avoided delving into regulatory issues, calling for comments on interference and emission concerns involving BPL services(CD April 24 p1). Questioning the agency’s decision to limit its investigation to technical issues, Comr. Copps wanted the FCC to look into issues such as the potential for cross- subsidization of services by power companies and the implications of BPL to universal service and pole attachments. Comr. Adelstein said it would be prudent to consider regulatory issues after the Commission knew more about technical factors.

Cable operators expressed anxiety whether certain “unreasonable” utility pole access and inspection practices could escalate as utilities pursued a business that would be in direct competition with cable and CLEC offerings. If the current BPL trials lead to commercial deployment, the Commission should make specific modifications, probably through a rulemaking, in its non-rate access and cost allocation rules, said Charter Communications and the cable associations of Fla., Ga., O., S.C. and Tex. in a joint filing. They said there already had been “significant” litigation because of “tensions” between utilities and communications attachers over pole access, particularly on surveys or new plant and overlashed installations.

“Cable operators attempting to attach to electric utility-owned poles recently have experienced an increase in delayed access to poles, the assessment of excessive pole attachment rental rates, the imposition of inspections and pole loading studies and formal permit requirement for overlashing, all of which contravene explicit case precedent and FCC rules,” the cablers said. Such actions delayed fiber deployment and made them more expensive, they said, and “even the prospect of access by BPL systems may lead to an escalation of these practices as utilities’ competitive neutrality with regard to 3rd-party pole use is reduced.” They said the FCC should: (1) “Carefully” monitor utilities’ engineering, pole loading and audit requirements for 3rd- party attachers to prevent any “increase in anticompetitive actions” by utilities deploying BPL. (2) Be prepared to supplement existing non-rate access and cost allocation precedent when BPL progressed through the trial stage.

Verizon said the advent of BPL along with other “largely deregulated” alternative platforms such as cable, satellite, fixed wireless and WiFi “reinforces the urgent need for the Commission to classify all broadband services under Title I and to treat all broadband services equally.” Calling for a deregulatory national policy for all broadband providers, it said all providers must “fit within a coherent regulatory scheme that treats all competitors equally and harmonizes the rights and obligations of all broadband providers.” Verizon said that, unlike cable and satellite, local telephone companies were being subject not only to the full range of Title II regulation but also to a host of additional requirements under the Computer Inquiries rules. While encouraging BPL deployment, the FCC also must ensure that it doesn’t interfere with existing and future telecom services, the carrier said.

Qwest said the FCC, besides addressing technical and interference issues, must resolve how it would treat BPL for regulatory purposes: “Specifically, the Commission must take steps to ensure that BPL providers do not improperly leverage their monopoly over the distribution of electric power to the benefit of their competitive BPL service.” Qwest said the emergence of BPL provided more reason to treat ILECs as “nondominant” carriers in their provision of broadband services. Sprint, saying it might consider deploying BPL technology in the future as an alternative means of providing access in selected areas, suggested the FCC involve existing standards sponsors such as the Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions and the Institute of Electronic & Electrical Engineers in testing for interference and establishing standards.

While broadcasters said they didn’t oppose BPL as a technology, they said the Commission shouldn’t authorize BPL in the TV broadcast bands because of potential degradation of analog and DTV signals. They said there were “insufficient” technical data that the broadcast industry and the Commission could use to “fully and properly evaluate” BPL’s potential to interfere with free over-the-air TV stations operating on the low VHF frequencies, including DTV signals. In a joint filing, the NAB and MSTV said the low VHF TV band already was polluted heavily with “man-made impulse type background interference” that was attributed in part to leaky power lines: “BPL systems radiating RF energy in the television broadcast bands are likely to lead to a further increase of the noise floor and may result in significant analog television picture disruption and total degradation of DTV signals.”

The Alliance for Public Technology (APT) urged the Commission to regulate BPL in a technology-neutral manner. Saying all broadband providers must operate under the same rules, APT said the current disparate rules for cable and DSL showed that “uneven regulations lead to uneven deployment.” An important component of regulatory parity for BPL should be the existence of consumer protections that were applicable to other telecom providers. APT said accessibility requirements under Sec. 255 of the Telecom Act also should be applied to BPL providers and BPL networks should be required to be interoperable with other broadband systems. Net2Phone urged the FCC to create regulatory certainty for BPL through a rulemaking addressing “only those regulations necessary to preserve public safety and prevent harmful interference.”

The United Power Line Council (UPLC) said existing Part 15 rules for carrier current systems provided adequate protections against interference. It said no interference had been reported in its members’ BPL field trials, which were conducted with the existing Part 15 limits and measurement procedures. Experience from the tests indicated BPL systems complied with Part 15 limits, and those rules protected licensed users against interference from BPL systems, the UPLC said: “If anything, the existing rules may be too stringent and unnecessarily limit the range of BPL, but certainly the emission limits do not need to be reduced to prevent interference.” Although late, BPL has arrived in the market at a “critical time,” the UPLC said, pointing out that FCC statistics showed there was no choice of broadband providers in 34% of the zip codes in the country and 16% of the country had no access at all.

The Power Line Communications Assn. urged the FCC to give primary consideration to actual field tests and surveys of those offering BPL services, and discount “speculative and self-serving comments offered by parties who seek to hinder the deployment of BPL technology.”