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The Internet United Kingdom

UK Broadband Rollout Trial To Target Hard-To-Reach Homes Through Water Pipes (theguardian.com) 78

Posted by BeauHD from the tapping-existing-infrastructure dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: The government has launched a [4 million pound] fund to back projects trialling running fiber optic broadband cables through water pipes to help connect hard-to-reach homes without digging up roads. The money will also be used to test out monitors in pipes that can help water companies identify and repair leaks more quickly. About a fifth of water put into public supply every day is lost via leaks and it is hoped that sensors could help deliver water companies' commitment to reduce water loss by half.

Infrastructure works, in particular installing new ducts and poles, can make up as much as four-fifths of the costs to industry of building new gigabit-capable broadband networks, the government said. The project is designed to help cut those costs, and is part of a plan to improve broadband and mobile signals in rural areas. The digital infrastructure minister, Matt Warman, said: "The cost of digging up roads and land is the biggest obstacle telecoms companies face when connecting hard-to-reach areas to better broadband, but beneath our feet there is a vast network of pipes reaching virtually every building in the country. So we are calling on Britain's brilliant innovators to help us use this infrastructure to serve a dual purpose of serving up not just fresh and clean water but also lightning-fast digital connectivity."
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UK Broadband Rollout Trial To Target Hard-To-Reach Homes Through Water Pipes More

UK Broadband Rollout Trial To Target Hard-To-Reach Homes Through Water Pipes

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  • Fluidic logic anyone? anyone? anyone?

  • running fiber optic broadband cables through water pipes

    I suppose if people can build undersea cables, then this isn't much different - if smaller. Though just how wide are the pipes running to properties outside of metropolitan areas?

    • Re:Internet on tap (Score:5, Informative)

      by davide marney ( 231845 ) on Tuesday August 10, 2021 @08:51AM (#61675859) Journal

      Here's how it's done: https://www.wateronline.com/do... [wateronline.com]

      Basically, it's pipes-within-a-pipe. A neat bit is they have to install reinforcing rings every 1.5m to attach the fiber pipes to, and those extra rings make the water pipe itself stronger, too. All at a loss of about 1% of flow.

      Neat trick.

      • Re:Internet on tap (Score:5, Interesting)

        by classiclantern ( 2737961 ) on Tuesday August 10, 2021 @09:41AM (#61676095)
        Your link is very interesting and is about running fiber through SEWER pipes, which is a MUCH better idea than water pipes. Contamination of drinking water is not an issue. Water pipes are under pressure. Access to sewers is easier, low pressure, and often mostly full of air of sorts making entry and exit points much easier. Over time the entry points in a water piper under pressure will cause as many leaks as they have now. I figure 20% more loss from new leaks in the new seals over the life of the project. Sewer pipes are much larger than water pipes so can easier handle the obstruction. A crew can walk through the larger sewer pipes making the job faster, easier, and cheaper. The condition of the sewer pipe/tunnel is likely worse than water mains so the project should be in conjunction with a sewer refurbishment. This is what the government should spend the money on. (Also, why not both?)

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by q_e_t ( 5104099 )
          Hard to get to areas in the UK often don't have mains sewer connections, although they often have mains water.
        • "Shiternet"?

        • Working in a sewer these days is an invitation to get COVID-19.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by mjwx ( 966435 )

          Your link is very interesting and is about running fiber through SEWER pipes, which is a MUCH better idea than water pipes. Contamination of drinking water is not an issue. Water pipes are under pressure. Access to sewers is easier, low pressure, and often mostly full of air of sorts making entry and exit points much easier.

          Yes, but I don't want the internet getting disconnected every time the guy in the next flat (apartment) takes a dump.

      • Your article is from 2001 so this idea has not gone anywhere in 20 years. That tells me it is not a good idea or it would have taken off by now. Something is holding-up the idea.
      • "YO DAWG,
        I heard you like drinking water while surf the web,
        so we put pipes inside pipes so you can stream while you stream".
      • https://www.craley.com/craley-... [craley.com] Better explanation of how this works and the company that does just this and through water mains.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mjwx ( 966435 )

        Here's how it's done: https://www.wateronline.com/do... [wateronline.com]

        Basically, it's pipes-within-a-pipe. A neat bit is they have to install reinforcing rings every 1.5m to attach the fiber pipes to, and those extra rings make the water pipe itself stronger, too. All at a loss of about 1% of flow.

        Neat trick.

        The problem is the water pressure in many parts of the UK is so low any loss would be huge. The water system is ancient in many parts of the UK as we were one of the first countries to have widespread running (as in piped into the home) water and sadly some of it still hasn't been upgraded (this is also why some of places in the UK still have separate hot and cold taps, because in the olden days valves weren't that good and you'd have the cold leaking into the hot water).

  • My house is in the middle of nowhere and has independent water and sewage

    • Re:Good luck with that (Score:5, Funny)

      by billybob2001 ( 234675 ) on Tuesday August 10, 2021 @08:17AM (#61675741)

      That's ok, you can subscribe to the "cloud delivery" service.

    • Guess you're the 0.01% then.

      • "More than 43 million people—about 15 percent of the U.S. population—rely on domestic (private) wells as their source of drinking water. "

        https://www.usgs.gov/mission-a... [usgs.gov]

        That said, running a fiber line through the water main is a interesting idea. How they intend to get around the isolation valves is an interesting question.

        And it reduces the targeting environment for the greatest threat to both water main and fiber line; rampaging backhoes.

        • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward

          "More than 43 million people—about 15 percent of the U.S. population—rely on domestic (private) wells as their source of drinking water. "

          Whereas this UK scheme is aimed at 0% of the US population.

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by aitikin ( 909209 )

            "More than 43 million people—about 15 percent of the U.S. population—rely on domestic (private) wells as their source of drinking water. "

            Whereas this UK scheme is aimed at 0% of the US population.

            Except where there is a similar scheme in the US [slashdot.org]

          • I know it was in the UK, but I still doubt that only 0.01% of the UK's population lives in the country.

            And although the summary said water pipes, sewer pipes would be much easier, if only due to a lot fewer valves. Although using a roto-rooter would become problematic.

            Our water service just ran a new connection across the road with "mole". It punched a One inch hole under the road with out having to dig it up. Why aren't they using those to get under roads? Using the water pipes would safe a lot of trenchi

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Teun ( 17872 )
              Horizontal drilling works up to about 2kms but just like the mole it fails wherever you find a lot of stones.
        • Anybody seen the inner diameter of a service line? This is a dumb idea.

      • Guess you're the 0.01% then.

        Isn't that who this scheme is aimed at?

        I could be one of that low %. Generally the phone lines and electricity around here come on overhead poles, so "digging up roads" for broadband is not likely to happen anyway. But my water supply has come such a long way and up to such an altitude (as remote places in the UK tend to be) it is at a low enough pressure already, so I don't like the idea of impeding the flow even more.

        • fiber optic lines are more sensitive to to damage from bending than the wires for electricity and phone lines, so it is common to install them underground even when right next to overhead utility poles. You can put them them on the overhead, but you need more expensive lines with thicker cladding, and you have to be giving your utility poles regular maintenance. In the US, some places maintain the poles well enough for that, but many do not. Poles can have a lot of lean to them, and shifting doesn't affect

  • At least as an American. I could easily see something in the wiring reacting over time in the water and contaminating it. Not that you couldn't do this safely, but at least here in America everything tends to be lowest bidder and it's common for companies to lie and cut corners in dangerous ways. That's how the Flint Michigan water crisis started. The governor of Michigan at the time gave a contract to one of his cronies who had no idea how to run a water plant and they cut costs on the treatment chemicals.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Teun ( 17872 )
      Some are especially worried about cross-contamination would you download a virus over such a line...

      • That's OK, if that happens I'll just go in to get a CHiP update from Ponch and Jon.

        People get all uptight about the CHiP without considering the practical conveniences it would bring.

    • I could easily see something in the wiring[sic] reacting over time in the water and contaminating it.

      Wait until you find out that the water pipes are already made of the same plastic as the cladding on the cables! LOL

      Don't worry, the companies that make it all agree that it is generally to be regarded as safe.

  • Also happening in US (Score:4, Informative)

    by catherder_finleyd ( 322974 ) on Tuesday August 10, 2021 @08:26AM (#61675773)

    The same thing is being done in Anacortes, WA:

    https://www.king5.com/article/tech/anacortes-high-speed-internet-water-pipes/281-e8b55da6-e190-4a54-bfda-d0104291d3f8

    https://www.bbcmag.com/community-broadband/anacortes-is-first-city-in-washington-to-become-an-isp

  • Ted Stevens described the internet as a series of tubes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Series_of_tubes)
    It looks like he was right!

  • Google had TiSP a while back (Score:4, Insightful)

    by chuckugly ( 2030942 ) on Tuesday August 10, 2021 @08:32AM (#61675787)

    Some time ago Google was introducing TiSP (https://archive.google.com/tisp/install.html) but it never seemed to reach critical mass. What is old is new again.

  • Just in case the rest of the world isn't aware, there is almost never any correlation between a UK politician's ministerial position and his prior knowledge on the subject.To illustrate the point, Matt Warman graduated university with an English degree. Inserting and extracting wires in and out of old pipes sounds very much like it will add more leaks than it fixes. "So we are calling on Britain’s brilliant innovators..." reminds me of Ali G's hover board invention that just needs some nerds to iron o

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by bws111 ( 1216812 )

      Have you ever heard of a profession called 'engineering'? It is where they use actual knowledge and experience on a subject to figure out solutions to problems that may be hard. Shocking! Of course, since it 'sounds' like it won't work to some idiot with absolutely NO knowledge about the subject, I guess it is not possible.

      Just imagine what would happen if some stupid politician challenged a country to land a man on the moon within a decade. Obviously THAT could never happen.

      • Yes, but in the UK the political classes look down on engineering; the old 17/18/19th centuries of people who know what they are doing being 'trade' (and thus lower class) as opposed to the 'enlightened elite' who study classics is still sadly prevalent.

        Even now, some government numpties are pushing for Latin to be taught in schools as a means of 'levelling up' -- a dead language used mainly for showing off, rather than something genuinely useful !

        On the water pipe idea -- someone with more knowledge than I

        • Totally agree on all those points. Though from an installation perspective I think every job will be different (and therefore expensive) and will come with a unique set of problems. Different types of pipe, elbows here and there, disturbance of lead pipes, access to stop cocks, seized stop cocks. Any valve in between would need to be replaced with a clever replacement (can't close a valve if a wire is running through it). I didn't spot in the article, but if it's about the problem of getting it in to the ho
      • Oh, where to begin with this comment? Let's begin with the fact that I have an engineering degree and I work for an engineering consultancy. I also dug my own water pipe along my driveway and piped it to my house. Comparing the Apollo program to putting a wire down a water pipe? That's a great example of one of the most amazing science/engineering feats of all time, that was monumentally expensive, and implemented primarily to get to the moon before the Russians. From a cost benefit perspective it was a mas

  • Just in time for a drought.

  • The UK currently leaks 3 billion litres of fresh water a day through bad pipes - so disturbing old but otherwise sealed pipes will just add to the wastage. Real stupid idea.

  • Are these people stupid? I saw ready to use solutions for this about 30 years back at Cebit. This is _old_ technology.

  • This doesn't seem ideal to me for a few reasons.
    1. how much will this cable in the water pipes restrict water flow? A fiber cable with insulation to protect it from the stresses of constant water flow, I could see the it using as much as 25% of the diameter of the pipe.

    2. Water is rather unforgiving, Having a pipe where the water isn't flowing in a nice round pipe, may have a lot of turbulence, as well put interesting stresses on the pipe and the internet cable.

    3. Water pipes can and do freeze and break, w

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by N1AK ( 864906 )
      It's literally a couple of minutes work to google typical water pipe and shielded cable diameters if you don't already know them. If you don't, and can't be bothered to look it up, it doesn't mean the people proposing it haven't or that you're adding anything to the discussion here by raising it again. 90mm (79mm bore) diameter pipes are rare and notably smaller than the vast majority of water mains. A 25% diameter cable within it (23mm) would take up less than 10% of the area of even these tiny pipes, and

    • > . how much will this cable in the water pipes restrict water flow?

      Around 1% or so.

      > Water is rather unforgiving, Having a pipe where the water isn't flowing in a nice round pipe, may have a lot of turbulence, as well put interesting stresses on the pipe and the internet cable.

      Century-old pipes that have so many breaks that they leak 20% of the water don't have laminar flow to begin with.

      > 3. Water pipes can and do freeze and break, which could then also disrupt a lot of internet

      A crack in the co

  • Corner Case (Score:3)

    by Thelasko ( 1196535 ) on Tuesday August 10, 2021 @09:16AM (#61675961) Journal
    This seems like a nice solution for a minority of homes. However, I suspect the hardest-to-reach homes use wells.

  • Didn't Google do an April Fool's about this. People would receive their cables and flush them down the toilet to be later collected and hooked up?

    Yes, here it is: Toilet Internet Service Provider (April Fool's Day - 2007)

  • They should use the water itself to carry the signal. Sure they might need slightly more powerful semiconductor lasers but worth every penny especially when turning on the faucet at night.

  • Sewer not supply pipes (Score:4, Informative)

    by WoodstockJeff ( 568111 ) on Tuesday August 10, 2021 @09:49AM (#61676135) Homepage

    The website linked in many of the above messages points out that this is the SEWER pipe, not the water supply pipes. No issues with water potability or VALVES.

    Hopefully, no issues with catching things and causing stoppages...

    Still not applicable to any of the "hard to reach" places I know of, where sewer and water lines are not found. There are many rural places where fiber trunks run alongside the roadway, but there is no hookup to it.

  • Had a well and septic system.

    The only "wires" into my house were electric and cable.

    Until the Ice Storm.

  • I hope they have a fluid rollout.

  • ...there's a snake in your toilet.

    That's no snake that's my broadband!

  • down the shitter.

  • Crumbling water infrastructure (Score:4, Informative)

    by VeryFluffyBunny ( 5037285 ) on Tuesday August 10, 2021 @02:43PM (#61677103)

    Let's see how this works out in practice. The UK govt, rather than invest in much needed repairs & renovations to the ancient & crumbling infrastructure - the main reason why >25% of clean water is lost through leaks - they decided to break it up & privatise it, promising that the new owners would have to invest in repairs. What the new owners did to reduce leakage was reduce the water pressure. This meant that many homes no longer had serviceable water supply & had to buy & install pumps to maintain enough pressure to make stuff work.

    That ancient, crumbling infrastructure is still there, as fragile as ever. Now they want to install internet cables inside it?

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