BRATTLEBORO — Both the Vermont Telephone Co. (VTel) and Sovernet Communications are working on projects to expand broadband Internet access in Vermont, but it looks as though Sovernet might be the first to start stringing fiber optic lines around the state.
Last week, the Bellows Falls-based firm announced that its Vermont FiberConnect project recently cleared a significant environmental review.
The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) issued a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) regarding the environmental impact of the project.
With this key regulatory hurdle cleared, Sovernet authorized utility pole owners Central Vermont Public Service, Green Mountain Power, and FairPoint Communications to start make-ready work in the Barre-Montpelier and White River Junction areas, as well as in other communities.
According to Sovernet Director of Communications Brandon Peyton, Sovernet Fiber Corp. - the affiliate of Sovernet Communications that received $33.4 million from the NITA to develop, build, and operate a 770-mile fiber-optic network - “has submitted applications to survey over 6,000 utility poles, with additional survey requests being submitted each week. All this work has been done so that we could be ready to begin our fiber network's construction phase as soon as we received our FONSI designation.”
In the coming months, Peyton said, Sovernet “will issue [requests for proposal] for fiber construction, fiber cable, and electronics.”
Vermont FiberConnect seeks to link more than 340 community anchor institutions, such as K-12 schools, colleges, public libraries, health-care providers, government offices, and public safety agencies in southern, central, and northeastern Vermont, encompassing seven of Vermont's 14 counties.
Vermont FiberConnect is also designed to provide wholesale data transport services to broadband and telecommunications service providers, such as Internet service providers, telecommunications firms, and cellular companies.
As for VTel's $116 million broadband expansion project, it has been delayed because of a pending environmental agreement with a federal agency.
According to VTel President Justin Robinson, the company's work was awaiting a “programmatic agreement” from the USDA Rural Development Rural Utilities Service before the company could start construction of an extensive network of fiber-optic cable and wireless 4G/LTE devices.
The rollout is supposed to extend Internet access “to virtually every unserved anchor institution, unserved home, and unserved business throughout Vermont.”
Rural Development awarded the grant to VTel in August 2010. The money must be spent by September 2013.
The federal agreement with VTel sets up environmental review requirements for the company's interactions with state and local officials. The agreement is designed to enable VTel and state agencies to work together to make efficient and considered decisions regarding fiber-optic and wireless tower buildouts.
Karen Marshall, chief of ConnectVT, an organization that assists with the development of information systems, said that the agreement is awaiting final approval by Rural Utilities Service.
“To my understanding, VTel and the Vermont [Division for] Historic Preservation, as well as the counterpart at Rural Utilities Service, have been working on a programmatic agreement,” Marshall said.
She added that, once federal approval is granted, VTel must apply for permits at the state level before construction begins.
Devin Colman, historic buildings specialist at the Vermont Division for Historic Preservation, explained that the programmatic agreement “lays out a framework in which everyone is on the same page as to how the project review will play out.”
Colman explained that this framework is necessary because VTel does not yet have exact plans for where they will be placing new equipment. The programmatic agreement spells out which consultations will be necessary with state government when these decisions are finally made by VTel.
Marshall, whose role in this project has been to facilitate VTel's communication with the state and federal government, said that this year's telecommunications bill, S.78, will help to expedite the permitting process at the state level.
VTel has indicated that the company will license its project through Title 30, Section 248a - an alternative to the Act 250 environmental review available to the telecommunications industry. Section 248a reviews are conducted by the Vermont Public Service Board.
The 248a process requires companies to submit an “intent to file” 45 days before they submit an application. However, for a large part of the VTel project, the company will be making what S.78 defines as “de minimis” modifications, which means that they will be modifying existing equipment.
In this case, VTel will be running fiber optic cable throughout their existing service footprint. The permitting process would therefore take 21 days, and would allow VTel to begin running cable by August, at the earliest.
Other aspects of the project, which involve erecting new signal towers for VTel's Wireless Open World network, could be delayed into mid-October as they await permitting processes that can reach 180 days in length.