A Blast From the Past - Far Wierder Than Finding an Old Presentation on the Web

Received a communication late yesterday from a very determined individual that wished to know the latest about Broadband in Gas, a topic we covered in a report about five years ago. The idea is that by using a particular type of RF technology it should be possible to utilize natural gas infrastructure to deliver broadband services to a dwelling. Given that the medium is underground and inside either a plastic or metallic pipe the RF spectrum is empty and unregulated, and has an available spectrum running from DC to light with essentially unlimited transmitted power.

'I gotcha 5 GHz and 60dbm right here pally.'



The idea never reached escape velocity for a number of reasons, most of which were financial and political, having nothing to do with the technical feasibility. The company promoting the idea ultimately re-purposed the approach and did some work on (mostly) non-invasive remote measurement of internal pipeline damage and now seems to have vanished. For a natural gas utility the potential value of the spectrum inside the pipes is enormous; hence the calls and email.

It turns out the call was triggered by this link: How the heck did this happen? which shows up in Google as having been posted within the past month or so.

Automated content generator gone bad? Early indication of renewed interest in the approach?

Who knows?