SPECIAL ALERT: BPL Standard Threat

UPLC/UTC Conference Call: On Wednesday, August 27, 2008, at 2:00pm Eastern US Time, the United Power Line Council (UPLC) and the Utilities Telecom Council (UTC) will jointly sponsor a conference call briefing on the state of broadband over power line (BPL) standards development with specific attention paid to how certain IEEE standards, slated for approval next month, could adversely impact your ability to use BPL for broadband access or Advanced Metering / Smart Grid applications.

All members of UPLC and UTC are strongly encouraged to assign someone to attend this critically important conference call. During the call, we will be seeking a consensus among UTC’s and UPLC’s members on:

1. What kinds of changes are necessary to make the BPL standard coexist without harm to electric company smart metering / smart grid applications?
2. How the UPLC representative at the IEEE meeting in September should vote on anticipated issues?

Please RSVP to Kristy Weinshel, UTC/UPLC Membership Director, for the call-in information. This call is only open to UTC and UPLC members.

Open Roundtable Discussion on BPL Standards: On Thursday, September 11^th, in Houston, Texas, there will be an open roundtable discussion on the threat posed by proposed BPL standards during the annual conference of the United Power Line Council – Broadband Power Line 2008. All registrants to the conference will be invited to give their opinions on how best to represent utility and access BPL provider interests at the IEEE meeting later in September.

For more information on the Broadband Power Line 2008 event, please visit the conference web site at www.bplconference.org.

Background:

There are a lot of BPL standards activities going on now. Some are close to completion, specifically those affecting the installation of BPL equipment standards and the measuring RF emissions standards. UTC and its affiliate, UPLC, have been making some headway through our participation in the IEEE P1901 MAC/PHY group finalizing hardware interoperability standards between in home and access BPL systems. However, more progress needs to be made and utilities need to be involved to protect their interests now and in the future to be able to deploy BPL on their distribution grid for broadband access and Advanced Metering / Smart Grid applications.

At issue are certain features and functionalities that are not currently included in the draft standard, but which are necessary to support interoperability and coexistence between Access and in-home BPL systems and devices. Some of these features and functions were included as part of an amended version of the standard that was introduced during the last meeting of the IEEE P1901 MAC/PHY group. UPLC and others – including utilities -- supporting Access BPL interests voted in favor of that amended version of the standard, but there were not enough votes to carry the 75% majority needed to confirm the standard. Opposition to the inclusion of these features and functions came primarily from in-home BPL companies that do not want to incur additional costs and delays in manufacturing production that would result from including these features and functions. They have proposed that these features and functions should be made voluntary (i.e. optional) rather than mandatory. Meanwhile, Access BPL interests are concerned that manufacturers will not develop equipment with these features unless they are made mandatory as part of the standard.

The next meeting of the IEEE P1901 will be critical to the success or failure of developing a standard which actually supports Access as well as in-home BPL. We need your input to improve the standard and to get enough votes to confirm it. Without your input, we may be left with a one-sided standard that raise technical and economic barriers to the use of the distribution grid for BPL to support broadband access and Advanced Metering and Smart Grid applications. Join us during this important conference call and help protect your interest in being able to use the distribution grid for BPL-enabled broadband and internal applications!