Its a long drive out to Somerset. Whether you are coming from nearby towns like Altoona or Pittsburgh, it is a good hour and a half from any major population. While it sits on popular state thoroughfares like I-76 and I-70, Somersets removed location near the Maryland border has made it challenging for cable or phone companies to offer internet service, leaving many rural PA residents to suffer the screeching, rattling slow-poke of the internet world: the dial-up connection.
Internet service isnt the first utility to shirk the Somerset faithful. In fact, the problem dates back to 1935, when President Roosevelt signed an executive order founding the Electrification Administration, granting funding for the creation of rural electric co-ops in towns like Somerset. Today, the internet has moved from a fun way to send messages to the backbone of our communication landscape. And this week, the Somerset Rural Electric Cooperative announced a partnership with International Broadband Electric Communications (IBEC), an Alabama company able to offer broadband service over power lines.
We serve five customers for every mile of line that we have up, where an average, investor-owned utility has somewhere in the neighborhood of 20-30 so its really not profitable for them and thats how we were formed. Just a bunch of people banding together to serve their own, says SREC General Manager Rich Bauer. We saw the same thing with the internet. We saw our kids, our neighbors at a disadvantage because a lot of the homework assignments, a lot of the people looking for jobs, a lot of small businesses rely on the internet heavily.
IBEC has set up at the Co-Ops Bando Substation, which serves more than 250 members in the substation area. The company currently offers three different high-speed Internet BPL packages: Basic, Ultra, and Extreme. SREC has seen great signal quality with the Bando substation that they are currently expanding to other member service areas.
We are an electric company first and foremost, but this is something our members were really crying out for, says Bauer. We decided it was time.
Source: Rich Bauer, Somerset Rural Electric Co-Op
Writer: John Steele
