1.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
18 April 201618 April 2016
Spectrum Policy Forum Workshop on
Spectrum Infrastructure Resiliency & Interference
Resilient Utility Communications
Adrian Grilli, Managing Director, JRC Ltd
(A joint venture between National Grid Gas plc and Energy Networks Association Ltd)

2.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
• Critical Utility Operational Communications
• Not all networks are the same …
• Voice (mobile)
• DATA (radio telemetry & telecontrol)
• Resilient network options
• Resilience
• Consequences
• Conclusions

3.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
Not all networks are the same …
(just because they’re invisible …)

4.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
Resilient emergency voice communications
•PMR
• PMR/DMR/eDMR/eLTE, possibly as both voice & data network
•Airwave
• Airwave until 2020: then Emergency Services Network (ESN)
•Satellite
• Iridium, Inmarsat, etc
• VoIP over VSAT from fixed location,
plus WiFi/DECT from substation fibre
•Roaming cellphone?
• EE and O2/Vodafone

5.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
• Critical Operational Communications - voice
PMR
PMR
PMR
PMR
PMR/Airwave
Airwave
Airwave
Airwave

6.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
• Critical Operational Communications - data
UHF
UHF
UHF
UHF
UHF
Satellite
UHF
Wired

7.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
Key elements of resilience
•Power independence
•Flooding?
•Backhaul capability
•Graceful degradation (no single points of failure)
Resilience issues
“Every extra ‘9’ on availability increases the cost by an order of magnitude”
(participant comment at Public Safety Europe Conference, Oxford December 2015)

8.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
Power independence

9.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
Resilience is multi-faceted

10.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
North America – 14 August 2003North America – 14 August 2003
Area of
blackout
Consequences – cascade failures & restoration challenges

11.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
Sunday 28 September 2003Sunday 28 September 2003
Consequences – cascade failures & restoration challenges

12.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
Consequences – cascade failures & restoration challenges

13.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
Electricity Black-outs: New world record!Electricity Black-outs: New world record!
31 July 2012:
650 million off supply
Consequences – cascade failures & restoration challenges

14.
Joint Radio Company:
Making the spectrum and
technology work for your business
www.JRC.co.uk
CONCLUSIONS
• Key potential spectrum access risks for your sector.
• Lack of additional suitable spectrum to manage increasing diversity
and distribution of energy supply.
• Perception that mobile networks can address all communications
requirements.
• Impacts of problems in sector.
• Economic impact of unreliable electricity supplies
• Sustainability and affordability targets.
• Social impact of interruptions to gas, water & electricity.
• Will the problem will get worse in the future?
• Increasing instability in electricity grid and lack of inertia in system.
• Increasing dependency on electricity and interconnection of grids.
• Policy initiatives to mitigate the issue.
• Access to suitable & sufficient spectrum
on a timely basis.
• Data confidentiality.
• Avoid ‘one-size-fits-all’ mentality.