Rural telecom: Network vendors go green

Jul. 15, 2009 (The Hindu Business Line) --

Roudra Bhattacharya

New Delhi, July 15 To enable mobile operators offer low-cost cellular services in the rural areas with less power, network vendors are bringing energy efficient base stations that run on renewable energy sources.

Rural telecom is the next big market with about 70 per cent of country’s 1.2 billion people concentrated in such areas. With as many as 50 per cent of the new subscriber base coming from the rural areas, vendors such as Nokia-Siemens (NYSE:NOK) , Huawei and Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU) are all introducing energy-efficient solutions.
Huawei: no air-conditioning

Mr A. Sethuraman, Executive Director, Huawei Telecommunications India. Huawei said, “The technology used in rural areas should be of low power consumption, more reliance on renewable source of energy such as solar and wind power.” The Chinese network vendor is rolling out WiMax-based broadband infrastructure in 1,000 blocks across India for BSNL. Huawei is using an architecture that saves power by not using air-conditioning.
Nokia: base stations

Equipment major Nokia-Siemens is targeting to use only energy-efficient base stations in remote areas by 2011. The company claims these base stations can reduce power consumption 70 per cent. “As mobile networks expand into the rural areas, we cannot always rely on infrastructure, as power grids are not always reliable or readily available and base station sites need to run autonomously. A sustainable alternative is to use renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power (OTCBB:SOPW) ,” says Mr Sandeep Bhargava, Head-Corporate Affairs (APAC Region), Nokia-Siemens Networks India.



The company has collaborated with ACME Tele Power to create customised solutions and to establish a joint development lab in India to examine future opportunities, specifically around remote energy monitoring.

Franco-American major Alcatel-Lucent has a technology that switches off the network if it detects no traffic. According to the company, this will allow savings of up to 25 per cent on the total power consumed daily.

According to the Ministry of Power estimates, 37 per cent of the 1.78 lakh villages in the country have no access to electricity. Of the villages that do have electricity, most suffer from an erratic supply. Such problems push up costs for network vendors that have to make alternate arrangements through generators.

The Department of Telecom recently launched a scheme from the Universal Services Obligation giving Rs 50 lakh per installation, for mobile towers running on renewable energy sources such as solar or wind.

(Source: iStockAnalyst )


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