ARRL Says "AirGig" is NOT Repackaged BPL

(AT&T image)

Recent news stories about AT&T's new "AirGig" service that promises to deliver broadband wireless by using power lines have many hams concerned that this is another attempt at implementing Broadband over Power Lines, or BPL, which caused significant interference on ham bands before failing economically a decade or more ago. But the ARRL says there's no cause for worry.

 According to a report in the ARRL Letter, the new system currently under test uses the surface of power lines to transmit millimeter-wave RF signals at frequencies between 30 and 300 GHz. The League does not expect to encounter interference problems, even among hams active on amateur allocations in that range. "The sky is not falling," says ARRL Lab Manager and BPL expert Ed Hare, W1RFI.