Some white space

The upcoming analogue TV switch-off opens up some exciting opportunities for utilities and other companies to exploit smart grid communications according to this fascinating article on Smartgrid Opinions.

TV White Space is the name given to the naturally occurring gaps in the spectrum used by TV bands. This “white space”, along with the numerous channels that are soon to be freed up as we transition to digital broadcast, offers a host of possibilities for new services and business models. Why? Well, for a start it’s cheap as using the spectrum is free. It’s available globally and (once the analogue switch is complete) there will be masses of bandwidth available.

There’s a lot of excitement growing around the use of TVWS at the moment as this recent Radio 4 broadcast illustrates. It’s an appealing technology for a number of different market sectors and applications such as M2M, rural broadband provision and smartgrid look set to benefit as adoption grows.

There’s still a long way to go though. As the article explains, the technology is complex, the ecosystem is immature and there is little existing regulation and standardisation to work.

Watch this (white) space…