west tennessee fiber association - …dev.utilitytechnology.org/conference/fall 2011...
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West Tennessee Fiber Association
Charles Phillips, P.E., V.P. Engineering & Technical Services
Robin McCaig, Network and Managed Services Coordinator
Gibson EMC
35,000 meters
2800 miles of primary distribution, 15
substations across 6 NW TN counties
5 Customer Service Centers
PLC Aclara system, USSI MDM, Survalent
SCADA, MilSoft OMS, Futura, Aclara Pre-Pay
What is West TN Fiber?
Loose Association of Electric Utilities to provide dark
fiber data transport services to Western Tennessee
Primary Goal is to provide services to help area
businesses and school systems connect disparate
facilities across large geographic areas
Products include dark fiber leases, MPLS Ethernet
transport, and support services to schools and
businesses using excess fiber capacity
Beginnings
Several utilities were approached by a regional data
transport carrier for access across NW Tennessee
Need for higher internal bandwidth capabilities
apparent due to installation of AMR/AMI systems.
Some municipal systems already had fiber networks
in place
Individually constructed fiber networks connected with
excess capacity made available as an Economic
Development tool
Gibson Fiber Network
Text
•Approximately 270
Miles of ADSS 60
and 96 count cable
•Connecting 5
Customer Service
Centers, 15
substations and
20+ downline
devices
West TN Fiber Backbone
West TN Fiber Backbone
Over 1000 miles of fiber cable
17 Utilities Interconnected
Will stretch from NES to MLG&W
Current Participants Gibson EMC (Dark Fiber & MPLS Transport)
Southwest EMC (Dark Fiber & MPLS Transport)
Weakley County Municipal Electric System (Dark Fiber &
MPLS Transport)
Paris BPU (Dark Fiber & MPLS Transport)
Union City Electric System (Dark Fiber)
Humboldt Utilities (Dark Fiber)
Jackson Energy Authority (Dark Fiber & MPLS
Transport)
Meriwether Lewis Electric Cooperative (Dark Fiber—
Under Construction)
Brownsville Utilities (Dark Fiber)
Current Participants
Newbern Utilities (Dark Fiber)
Dyersburg Electric System (Dark Fiber)
Benton County Electric System (Dark Fiber)
Carroll County Electric System (Dark Fiber)
Dickson Electric System (Dark Fiber)
Forked Deer Electric Cooperative (Dark Fiber)
Ripley Power & Light (Dark Fiber & MPLS
Transport)
Milan Utilities (Dark Fiber)
More to Come!
What do these utilities have in common?
Fiber Optic Cable Plant with excess capacity
Geographical proximity to each other in order to make fiber interconnects
Common Network Platform for MPLS Transport (Cisco) when providing lit transport
Willingness to work together in order to achieve something greater; the whole is greater than the sum of the parts
Respect for each utilities customer base and service footprint
What is the primary customer focus?
School Systems in partnership with Education
Networks of America (ENA)
Other government entities
Banks and other multi-location businesses
Medical Facilities
Cellular Phone Providers
Local Exchange Carriers (CLECs and ILECs)
Cable Television Providers
Internet Service Providers
Regional Telecommunication Companies
Case I - ENA Partnership
Hub and Spoke Network
Fiber optic cable is aggregated back to the
Board of Education (LEA) or county wide high
school for each school system
Spokes are home runs back to each
elementary, middle school or high school
complex
MPLS Lit Egress circuit (ethernet) at many
Board of Education office back to a router co-
located at Gibson EMC’s co-location facility
Case Study: ENA
ENA Network
ENA/West TN Fiber
What is the dark fiber product?
Local Utility provides the facilities in the customers
premise that allows access to the fiber plant
Customer puts their own equipment on the fiber and
lights up the fiber
Serving utility is responsible for billing the customer for
use of the fiber optic plant
Serving utilities maintain a Service Level Agreement
(SLA) for the integrity of the fiber optic cable in their
respective service territory and any splicing needed
Inter-Utility Compensation occurs if a dark fiber lease
spans multiple systems (transparent to the customer)
What is MPLS lit transport?
MPLS stands for Multiprotocol Label Switching
Developed as a way to transparently haul customer
traffic across a common service provider backbone
Customer traffic is entirely encapsulated so that there
is no touching of customer traffic and internal traffic
Transport mechanism can be many different mediums
including ethernet, frame relay, ATM, etc.
What are the MPLS lit transport
Ethernet products?
Ethernet over MPLS (EoMPLS): A Layer 2 transport
product that provides a point-to-point link across the
interconnected utilities backbone
Virtual Private LAN Service (VPLS): A Layer 2
transport product that provides a point-to-multipoint
connection to multiple customer sites across the
interconnected utilities backbone
Case Study: Gibson EMC &
STEMC
Installed a joint truck radio system last year (UHF,
Motorola) to allow transparent roaming across either
system without losing contact with dispatch
Dramatically improved service area because either
utility could use any towers that were closer in proximity
Installed AVL that can work across both systems using
radio data channel/GPS
Established multiple fiber interconnects to create a
looped infrastructure which ensures uptime in case of a
fiber cut (improves CSC communication uptime)
Case Study: Gibson EMC & STEMC
Why West TN Fiber has been
good for utility members:
Provides ancillary revenue source using excess
capacity (fiber and Ethernet)
“Contract in hand before we expand” mentality reduces
risk
Enables joint utility services such as offsite backup for
disaster recovery purposes, offsite rack space, or
sharing of data and mobile communication systems
(truck radios, AVL) across multiple utilities
Economic Development—fiber access is a must
Downline Breaker Install
Contact Info •Charles Phillips, P.E.
•Vice President of Engineering & Technical Services
•731-562-1310
•731-414-1241 cell
•Robin McCaig
•Network and Managed Services Coordinator
•@robinmccaig
•731-562-1340
•731-414-1235 cell