Fiber Optic
The Future

In conjunction with the Chelan, Douglas, and Grant County PUD’s, Northwest Internet is bring high-speed Fiber Optic Cable to your home or business. Join the most advanced state of the art network in the country. Call to see when this service will be available in your neighborhood.

Another facet of the PUD's fiber program is membership in the Northwest Open Access Network (NOANet). Chelan, Douglas and Grant County PUD’s have joined more than a dozen public utilities to form NOANet. This group will take advantage of excess capacity on Bonneville Power Administration fiber-optic lines. Member utilities will use this regional link for their own high-speed Internet access, videoconferencing, networking and telephone -- potentially savings thousands of dollars in long-distance charges.

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Fiber Optic
The Answers

What is fiber optics?

In its simplest terms, fiber optics is a medium for carrying information from one point to another in the form of light. Unlike the copper form of transmission, fiber optics is not electrical in nature.

A basic fiber optic system consists of a transmitting device, which generates the light signal; an optical fiber cable, which carries the light; and a receiver, which accepts the light signal transmitted. The fiber itself is passive and does not contain any active, generative properties.

The use of fiber optics in telecommunications ranges from global networks to local telephone exchanges to Internet subscribers' homes. All involve the transmission of voice, data, or video over distances from less than a mile to hundreds of miles, these services are delivered literally, at the speed of light.

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Fiber Optic
The Benefits

A fiber optic transmission system -- a fiber optic transmitter and receiver, connected by fiber optic cable -- offers a wide range of benefits not offered by traditional copper wire or coaxial cable. These include:

• The ability to carry much more information and deliver it with greater fidelity than either copper wire or coaxial cable.
• Fiber optic cable can support much higher data rates, and at greater distances, making it ideal for transmission for digital data.
• The fiber is totally immune to virtually all kinds of interference, including lightning, and will not conduct electricity. It can therefore come in direct contact with high voltage electrical equipment and power lines. It will also not create ground loops of any kind.
• As the basic fiber is made of glass, it will not corrode and is unaffected by most chemicals. It can be buried directly in most kinds of soil or exposed to most corrosive atmospheres in chemical plants without significant concern.
• Since the only carrier in the fiber is light, there is no possibility of a spark from a broken fiber. Even in the most explosive of atmospheres, there is no fire hazard, and no danger of electrical shock to personnel repairing broken fibers.
• Fiber optic cables are virtually unaffected by outdoor atmospheric conditions, allowing them to be lashed directly to telephone poles or existing electrical cables without concern for extraneous signal pickup.
• A fiber optic cable, even one that contains many fibers, is usually much smaller and lighter in weight than a wire or coaxial cable with similar information carrying capacity. It is easier to handle and install, and uses less duct space. (It can frequently be installed without ducts.)
• Fiber optic cable is ideal for secure communications systems because it is very difficult to tap but very easy to monitor. In addition, there is absolutely no electrical radiation from a fiber.

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