Light Signals Along The Communications Infrastructure

I was talking to my sister just the other day about the NBN. Turns out she knew very little about it. Sure she was aware that fibre was the better and faster option when compared to copper, but that was pretty much it. It occurred to me that what has been missing in the NBN discussions was some mechanics on the nitty gritty. Well here goes.

The Labor FTTP plan had a cost that was on track to be around $43 billion dollars. $30.1 billion of that was to be borrowed from the Australian Government Future Fund to be paid back at the rate of 7% on a plan that had been confirmed by a senate estimates committee as being fairly well on track. The rest of the cost was to come from profits of completed connections and some privately funded equity.

This method,  the method currently being rolled out prior to the election, would have brought Fibre into 93% of premises across the country.  The remaining 7% being too impractical or remote to run fibre to, would have access to fixed wireless or satellite. The interim satellite currently used for regional areas,  will be replaced with an all new purpose built one that will supply greater speeds (not as fast as fibre, but fast enough considering the impracticability of running fibre to these areas).

Optic fibre is a fantastic product. Supposedly backwards engineered from discoveries of the spacecraft that crashed near Roswell in 1947 (according to a General Corso in his book: The Day After Roswell), it is to this day the fastest medium for the transference of data between two points. It has been demonstrated that absolutely staggering speeds can be obtained with optic fibre not dissimilar to that currently being installed. This optic fibre is limited only by the electronics at each end. These electronics can be upgraded relatively cheaply over time. The laying of the fibre, which only needs to be done the once, is where most of the cost is borne.

No one really knows how long the optic fibre will last. Whilst arbitrary figures of around 25 years have been bandied around, truth is, this is just an estimate used mostly for accounting purposes. Original cables laid commercially in the 1970's are still going strong. Optic fibre cable is inert to its surrounding environment and there is no reason for it to ever wear out (excavation damages excepted).

Not only is optic fibre orders of magnitude faster than copper, it is also cheaper to power than copper. These power savings have been estimated to be around $900 million a year. Copper wire needs periodic power boosters to keep the signal alive. Signals that travel along optic fibre, however, can go many thousands of kilometres before degrading to the point of needing boosting. Effectively, light entering the optic fibre at the exchange can go all the way to the premises without any extra power input at all. This is a big saving on energy costs; pretty good if you like the idea of being green.

But this is just the start. Some clever boffins are working on something they call Photonic Routers. Photonic Routers will replace electronic routers and use light to direct the signals along the various paths to reach its destination. Originally started as a project to help save on power, it has the added bonus of being extremely fast  - much faster than today's routers. Testing is showing  that they can take virtually anything the specially made lab equipment can throw at it.