The White House's Office of Management and Budget has rejected the FCC's plan to require carriers to juice most cell towers with at least eight hours of backup power, citing a failure to solicit public comments. In this case, "public comments" would particularly refer to the CTIA and its members, which had sued to stop the FCC in its tracks; besides the staggering cost of outfitting a majority of towers with backup power systems, carriers have argued that they already have sufficient disaster recovery plans in place for making sure service interruptions are held to a bare minimum following a loss of juice. The FCC says it's "considering [its] options" following the ruling; technically they can overrule the OMB on the matter, but they'll just be staring down the barrel of the CTIA's suit if they do.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Eric @ Dec 7th 2008 10:02AM
Most, if not all, tower sites have some sort of backup power now, the question is how long do you want them to run unattended? Most companies figure on 3-4 hours of generator power, plenty of time to dispatch a tech with a gas can, if necessary. The tower sites in cities are usually connected to natural gas, so theoretically could run forever, unless the gas lines are cut (granted, could happen in an earthquake, for example).
The bigger issues are when fiber optic lines are cut, the communication shack is flooded, or the system is just plain overloaded. Backup power is fairly well understood and the government should find better things to do.
Fuzzmanmatt @ Dec 7th 2008 3:08PM
I think this is a terrible idea. Oh look honey, another surcharge to keep something that was already at the cell site there! Hooray!
Brian @ Dec 7th 2008 3:16PM
Hell no. Please don't do this.
The money needs to be invested in more towers or upgrading the towers with 4G.
Unless there is nuclear war, I don't foresee this being a big problem. Cell phones are not exclusively relied upon by emergency services.
Besides, I'm sure everyone knows at least one HAM. >.> (Although, you're going to have to sincerely apologize for calling the HAM a dork for all those years)
keithwwalker @ Dec 7th 2008 9:33PM
The people of New Orleans would beg to differ.
SuperH @ Dec 8th 2008 10:38AM
The people of New Orleans should know that their city is a sinking ship.
They should maybe... pick a place that is ABOVE sea level to live?