Internode covers Coorong

Internode has blended ADSL2+ broadband with solar-powered microwave towers to deliver broadband coverage for Coorong District Council in South Australia.

The ISP built a voice and data broadband network that delivers broadband to around 6000 residents and businesses in the 8800 square kilometre area south east of Adelaide.

In conjunction with the council it built microwave radio towers that deliver Internode Wireless broadband across the Coorong landscape to reach peop0le in smaller townships and on farms.

Tim Drew, CEO, Coorong District Council, said the Internode network has reduced the council’s voice call and data charges by around $30,000 a year, nearly three times the originally anticipated saving of $11,000 per annum.

“Many people live well away from major towns or settlements, so they find it hard to access services that are easy for people in town. If they can get high-speed broadband in their homes, it means they don’t have to travel 100km to town,” he said.

Daryl Knight, national sales manager, Internode said the geography of the area lent itself to deploying the technology.

“It’s a wide area which helped when putting up the towers. We designed the network to meet the broadband needs of a low population density in this large area,” he said.

The Coorong Project was funded by federal, state and local government resources as well as an unspecified cash from Internode.

Of the 17 towers, 12 are self-powered through the use of $12,000 power systems that feature solar arrays, charge controllers and high capacity batteries.

These Solar Wireless Access Node (SWAN) towers - designed by Internode - have a battery capacity to run for several days without significant sunlight and are fully remote monitored.

Internode MD Simon Hackett (pictured) said “for this project, we built our own backhaul channel to Adelaide, giving us end-to-end control over the costs of our network and the whole network is also independent of Telstra”.