Glasgow Housing Association is trialling the delivery of internet access to some of its tenants using powerline technology from Power Ethernet.
GHA is using Powerline Sockets to share and deliver a single internet connection to six flats. The sockets use the existing mains electrical cabling within a home to deliver a fast and reliable data connection, avoiding the cost and disruption of needing to run new cabling through walls and floors.
Evelyn McDowall, lead for digital inclusion, Glasgow Housing Association, said, “Over the next couple of years, the drive by UK and Scottish Governments to put most public services online, including welfare benefits, makes it vital for tenants to have email and internet access. This is why we are looking at schemes like this to see how we can roll out internet access to all of our tenants in the future.”
Internet access is provided through a TalkTalk superfast broadband contract, and each socket has four Ethernet ports and was installed by local installation company City Building. VLAN intelligent switching built into each Powerline Socket ensures that data is shielded between properties.
James Gardiner, marketing director, Power Ethernet, said, “There is still a large part of the UK population that can’t afford a broadband connection. Housing providers are in a strong position to approach this because they can address connectivity ‘per-block’, rather than per-tenant, as the GHA scheme shows.
“With the Powerline Socket, we can bring an entire block of flats online within hours, and because it shares a form factor with a standard mains socket and is wired identically, installation can be completed quickly by a local electrician.”
