Power line communication (PLC) is wireline method of communication using the existing electric power transmission and electricity distribution lines. The carrier can communicate voice and data by superimposing an analogue signal over the standard 50 or 60 Hz voltage frequency. There are two main classes of PLC :
- PLOC Power Line Outdoors Telecoms: this is the telecoms between the electric substations and home networks (PLC modems). The standard is ETSI PLT, twenty times faster than ADSL.
PLC modems employs 11 Volts and transmit in high frequency ( 1.6 to 30 MHz electric carrier). The asymmetric speed in the modem is generally from 256 Kbps to 2.7 Mbps.
In the repeater situated in the meter room the speed is up to 45 mbps and can be connected to 256 PLC modems.
In the medium voltage stations, the speed from the head ends to the Internet is up to 135 Mbps. To connect to the Internet, utilities can use optical fiber backbone or wireless link.
- PLIC Power Line Indoors or Internal Telecoms: This is using the home grid to establish telecoms, such as the Homeplug system. PLIC is one of the technologies used in domotics (another is wireless telecoms; the utilities can offer too wireless middleware (integrated PLC and WiFi based structure).
PUA is the PLC Utilities Alliance.
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