November 29, 2006
By Anish Abraham
IN an effort to modernise its internal communications capacity and thereby improve service delivery, Johannesburg City Power has been rolling out a Tetra digital radio network across the City since the start of the year.
Tetra, or Terrestrial Trunked Radio, is a specialist professional mobile radio standard used by police, ambulance and fire services around the world. The South African Police Service is also busy rolling out a countrywide Tetra network.
"Tetra is a fully digital radio system. It can be deployed easily where dead spots are, while the intelligence of the radio allows communication with the control unit within 15 seconds," said Brian Kelly, the chief technology officer for radio communications at City Power. The utility will start making use of the system once they have been allocated the necessary frequencies by the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa.
The system being phased out by the City's electricity utility can be traced back some 25 years, to when the organisation was known as Metropolitan Electricity. That radio network made use of Midband frequencies, which range from 66 megahertz to 88 megahertz.
"Those radio channels worked with limited coverage in the old regions and could not meet the required coverage that was needed for City Power's area of operation," he said. "At the beginning of this year it was decided to move to Tetra."
One of the major advantages of the Tetra network over the old system is the ability to dispatch job cards to repair technicians. The new network has a built-in global positioning system, or GPS, to enable the dispatch operator to send the fault report to the closest available technician. It can also connect to the City's Public Telephone Network infrastructure.
In addition, the radio system can be installed in the buckets that technicians use when they work on overhead power lines. "The mobile radio can also be converted into a temporary repeater in poor signal conditions," Kelly explained.
Although it operates on an open frequency, because it is a fully digital system only users connected to the network can listen to transmissions. Kelly said the initial rollout cost of five base stations to cover City Power's area of operations was estimated at R5-million.
The more reliable and secure form of communication enhances the safety of electricians working on the City Power network and dispatching repair staff to faults is more efficient.
To start, City Power aims to give portable handsets to about 150 operational staff members who handle switching and electrical faults. Eventually, the intention is to ensure that all employees, including management, have portable handsets.
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