$14.9 million in broadband grants in Tennessee's fourth round of the program include telephone and electric cooperatives which will help extend service to 7,120 unserved homes and businesses. These include the Bledsoe Telephone Cooperative, the Volunteer Energy Cooperative, and others bringing fiber service to unconnected locations.
Tag: "electric cooperative"
Posted April 6, 2021
by Maren Machles
Talladega, AL has long been known as the epicenter of NASCAR, a sport synonymous with speed. In 1987, Bill Elliot set the fastest recorded time of 212.089 mph on that very track.
Cars aren’t expected to start racing down the Talladega Superspeedway track until late April, but the Coosa Valley Electric Cooperative (CVEC) chose the location to announce the fittingly super fast speeds it expects to begin serving up with its new broadband subsidiary, Coosa Valley Technologies, last Wednesday.
Unfortunately, many residents in Talladega County and surrounding counties have long gone without fast connectivity, with average speeds as low as 5 Mbps (Megabits per second).
CVEC often holds events at the Superspeedway, but for this event they wanted to make sure that since people were gathering, social distancing was possible. Also they wanted to communicate a message.
“It also served as a good backdrop for what we were trying to communicate, which was, we’re going to be provided the fastest broadband service in our area,” Jon Cullimore, CVEC Manager of Marketing and Member Services, told us in an interview as the cooperative prepares to embark on a fiber build intended to bring fast, affordable Internet access to everyone in its electric footprint over the next four years.
Driven by Membership
It all started in 2019 with feasibility studies conducted by two different firms. Both found a profound lack of broadband service throughout CVEC’s service territory, which is situated east of Birmingham.
When the studies were completed, CVEC quickly put together a comprehensive information packet for members to get educated before their annual meeting last September. The members were asked to vote on whether or not CVEC should form a new broadband subsidiary and embark on a new phase of life.
“We got the word out, and we had a record attendance at our annual meeting. We’ve never had that many members show up before,” Cullimore said. “I think we only had 12 ‘no’ votes out of all the [more than] one thousand people that showed up.” 
CVEC quickly got to work...
Read more
Posted March 24, 2021
by Ry Marcattilio-McCracken
Franklin, Kentucky’s (pop. 8,400) electric utility is gearing up for an expansion of its partnership with Warren Rural Electric Cooperative Corporation (WRECC) with the help of $2.3 million from the recent FCC Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF). The new partnership will allow Franklin EPB to add new service to roughly 250 locations adjacent to a current project in the area.
The expansion project will add subscribers in the northeast region of Simpson County and nearby parts of the city of Franklin in the south-central part of the state, where the two entities are operating a two-area fiber pilot.
It represents the growth of a collaboration between Franklin EPB and the electric cooperative. In 2019, the two partnered up to deploy service with Franklin EPB leasing dark fiber from the cooperative and acting as service provider to “350 of its customers in northeast Simpson County and in an area on the southeast side of Franklin.” The project brought symmetrical 100 Megabit per second (Mbps) and 1 Gigabit per second (Gbps) options for $60 and $80/month to those locations and has brought service to a lot of happy members.
“Providing high-speed Internet [access] in rural areas has been and continues to be an important issue nationwide. Fortunately, we have been able to develop a successful model with Franklin EPB. We’re delighted to be able to expand our service in Simpson County immediately thanks to the RDOF funding,” said Dewayne McDonald, President and CEO of Warren RECC, at the announcement. He continued to emphasize that "part of our mission is to improve the quality of life for our members. This expansion represents a giant leap in progress for them, and we’re excited about the momentum. For the areas we didn’t win, we hope the companies that did win them will live up to their commitment to serve our...
Read more
Posted February 24, 2021
by Sean Gonsalves
Local fishing guides suggest skipjack and shad as the best bait for catching the monster catfish swimming in the muddy waters of Wheeler Lake.
But if you want to reel in broadband hungry subscribers living and working in nearby Morgan or Lawrence County, the Joe Wheeler Electric Membership Corporation (JWEMC) is hoping fiber optic lines and a free Amazon Fire TV Stick will lure subscribers to sign up for the electric co-op’s new gig speed Internet service, FlashFiber.
Trinity, just a few miles away from Wheeler Lake, is where JWEMC began hanging fiber optic cables before launching construction of a new Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) network weeks before the start of the new year. The $95 million project is expected to take five years to finish, though some subscribers may get service as early as this year despite construction delays caused by the COVID crisis with manufacturers of network components temporarily shut down under quarantine protocols.
Once the total buildout is complete, the network will cover JWEMC’s service area in both counties where the utility has been delivering electricity for the past 83 years. When it’s all said and done, the fourth largest electric co-op in “The Heart of Dixie,” will have deployed 15.8 million feet of fiber (nearly 3,000 miles), making the network accessible to all of the utility’s 43,000 members.
That’s a lot of fiber. But then again, Lawrence County is 700 square miles with a population of 34,000. The neighboring Morgan County is about 600 square miles with a population of 120,000. Both counties are considered part...
Posted February 22, 2021
by Ry Marcattilio-McCracken
Three northern Indiana county electric cooperatives have announced construction of brand new Fiber-to-the-Home networks which will bring more competition and high-quality Internet access to almost 25,000 homes and businesses in the state once complete.
Jasper County REMC announced its intentions at the beginning of December last year. Incorporated in 1938, its service territory sits in the northwest part of the state and provides electric service to more than 8,500 members over 1,100 miles of line in Jasper County as well as parts of White, Starke, Pulaski, Porter and Newton counties.
Construction will take five or so years to complete, but initial connections can be brought online as early as the first part of next year. Jasper REMC is beginning with a smart grid ring that will be done at the end of 2021, and is working with Wabash Valley Power and National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative during this first stage. They just hired a broadband manager at the end of 2020, who said of the endeavor:
Employees from a variety of businesses have proven that highly-skilled work can be done anywhere — as long as the tools are in place. Our cooperative realizes that advanced Internet infrastructure shouldn’t be a luxury. It is just as important as electricity.
In the Northeast Part of the State
Jasper is joined by Steuben County REMC, which announced around the same time that it will also be tackling broadband for its membership. Though its planning began two years ago, the cooperative finalized its purchase of the Indiana Metropolitan Area Network (iMAN) in January of 2021. iMAN’s history runs back more than two decades, originating in efforts by local officials and business owners left behind by commercial data providers....
Read more
Posted December 22, 2020
by Ry Marcattilio-McCracken
In the short span of weeks since a membership vote to give the co-op the tools needed to pursue broadband projects for its 84,000 members, the New Hampshire Electric Cooperative has connected its first 900 households. The ceremoney took place in Lempster, where the first electric user was connected 81 years ago.
Posted December 10, 2020
by Ry Marcattilio-McCracken
Central Virginia Electric Cooperative's broadband subsidiary, Firefly Broadband, continues to make progress on installations in Amherst and Nelson counties for 310 homes using CARES funds. The project is scheduled to go live by the end of this year.
Posted December 4, 2020
by Ry Marcattilio-McCracken
$14 million worth of CARES-funded broadband projects in the state of New Hampshire are moving along smoothly, according to New Hampshire Public Radio. Grant winners in Bristol, which is building 24 miles of fiber to 400 residences, and the New Hampshire Electric Cooperative, which is using $6.7 million to connect 900 homes in Clarksville, Colebrook, Lempster, and Stewartstown. The deadline is December 15.
Posted November 18, 2020
by Ry Marcattilio-McCracken
The New Mexico ISP is partnering with Sierra Electric Cooperative in the wake of getting a $6.1 million grant to deploy 271 miles of new fiber to connect more than 1,600 people in Siera County. 75% of residents there currently lack access to high-speed wireline broadband.
