West Virginia Broadband Connectivity Ahmed Saeed, Bao Nguyen, and Peter Gardner George Mason University, Spring 2017 1
Problem Statement and Scope Rural areas lack high speed internet access Students, businesses, citizens fall behind How can we get broadband to the people in these West Virginia counties? Logan and Wyoming Previously Mercer and McDowell as well The goal of this project is to assess the coverage, understand the options, and the tradeoffs between the options, for providing broadband internet access to a key area in southern West Virginia. 2
3
4
5
Components of Project Stakeholder Analysis Income, population Conditions Requirements Technological Analysis Current/expanded coverage (GIS) Functional issues with rural environment Available commercial alternatives General expansion costs Economic Analysis Visualization of relationships Sensitivity analysis Adoption rate 6
Stakeholders Citizens of selected WV counties Logan, [McDowell, Mercer,] Wyoming Government Local, state, federal Local internet service providers Shentel, Frontier, AT&T, Verizon.. Project sponsors Advancing Appalachia Initiative Dr. Michael Hieb Shepherd University 7
Citizens of Southern WV Counties Counties Population Wyoming County Data 8
Coverage Analysis GIS (Geographic Information Systems) software QGIS ArcGIS Goals Evaluate current coverage Identify gap areas Analysis of demographics Data Main source: GeoTel Shentel for wired coverage validation FCC and USGS for wireless coverage validation 9
Cable 19528 64% Fiber 1629 5.3% ADSL only 4393 14% No Coverage 5134 17% 10
AT&T 28121 92% Verizon 6696 22% US Cellular 27 0.1% WVVA.NET 32 0.1% No Coverage 2447 8.0% 11
89% wireless coverage 69% cable/fiber coverage 98% overall broadband coverage (ADSL not included) Wireless No Wireless Cable/Fiber 18316 60% 2841 9.3% No Cable/Fiber 8953 29% 574 1.9% 12
Available Commercial Alternatives Cable/Fiber Fast and reliable Moderate cost for users Costly to expand Mobile Wireless Great coverage Dead Zones Moderate cost for users (A)DSL Relies on phone lines Unreliable performance Low cost for users Not expanding Fixed Wireless Fast when available Requires LOS - Limited coverage area Typically uses unlicensed spectrum Costly to expand Satellite Wide availability Spotty performance High latency High cost for users 13
Available Alternatives Summary Technology Type Connection Download Speeds Type Consumer Latency ISP Expansion Cost Monthly Cost Mbps/$ Dial-up Wired 56 kbps 150 ms Not expanding N/A 0.002 DSL Wired 5-25 Mbps 49 ms $30 0.500 Satellite Wireless 3-6 Mbps 670 ms $554/installation $60 0.075 Fixed Wireless Wireless 10-25 Mbps 30 ms $39 0.449 4G Mobile Wireless Wireless 3-25 Mbps 110 ms $200k/tower $71 0.197 Cable Wired 10-50 Mbps 32 ms $75k/mile $60 0.583 Fiber Wired 25-100 Mbps 24 ms $30k/mile $100 0.625 R&D 2019+ <$20? 1.375 <$20? 0.550 Not expanding $25k-250k/tower Future Options: Subsidized Low Orbit Satellite (OneWeb/SpaceX) Wireless 5-50 Mbps 35 ms Balloon Wireless 4G LTE(Google Loon) Wireless 5-22 Mbps 150 ms R&D No Est. 14
Tiered Consumer Options Technology Speed Price Time Frame Available Now Short-term Solution DSL/Satellite 5-10 Mbps DSL - $30-80/month Satellite $80-120/month Mid-term Solution Cable/Fiber 5-100 Mbps Cable - $50-80/month Fiber - $100+/month 1-5 Years Long-term Solution Subsidized Satellite Up to 50 Mbps Estimated <$20/month 2-10 Years 15
Economic Analysis Methodology Adoption Rate shifted focus Developed dynamic system model Provides visualization of relationships Display effects of broadband adoption on income, population, and ISP revenue Explanation of methodology and procedures Software used Variables and links definitions Usage with case studies Conduct sensitivity analysis Training/education and subsidies 16
Key Variables and Relationships Broadband Adoption vs Income Benefits, Employment Every 10% of adoption ~ 1.2% increase in income Every 1% of adoption ~ 0.25% increase in employment Available Training vs Broadband Adoption With training, BB adoption rate increases by 1.2% annually Subsidy vs. Broadband Adoption Every $10 of subsidy increases adoption 3% Expansion of Infrastructure Cable $75K/mi Fiber $30K/mi Cellular $225K/tower 17
Economic Analysis Wireless Model 18
Sensitivity Analysis - Wireless expansion 19
Sensitivity Analysis - Wired expansion 20
Model and Results Verification Compared model outputs for Income and Employment against regression lines of known linear relationships Employment Increase = Adoption Rate(%) x 0.25% Income Increase = Adoption Rate(%) x 1.2% Reached out to domain experts for comment Pending Model results deviated within 4.9% of estimated for Income, <1% 13% for Jobs *Data from Wired Model in Logan County Case Study 21
Northwest Logan County: Adequate wireless coverage Minimal wired coverage Huff Creek Valley: No wireless coverage Some wired coverage 22
One existing fiber line: Not currently used for domestic coverage here Two new wires suggested: Could be either cable or fiber; some overlap 23
Northwest Logan County Analysis As is Expanded New wire length (km) 28.22 Cost per km $19k Cable/Fiber 0 0% 703 46% ADSL-only 426 28% 209 14% New wire cost $530k No connection 1088 72% 602 40% Predicted 10-year $1.6M revenue Predicted 10-year Adoption Rate 44% 24
25
26
Huff Creek Valley Analysis Connectivity improvement 404 currently without wireless coverage 314 (78%) covered by proposed new tower Expansion cost Tower construction costs $225k Revenue Model predicts revenue of $1.23M from new tower over the first ten years 27
Wired/Wireless Economic Comparison 10 Year Results* Wired Wireless Wired** Wireless Population Connected 745 745 Expansion Cost $600k $225k Adoption Rate 39% 27% Income Gain(%) 25.0% 21.2% Revenue $718k $1.23M *Using same demographic information for the region as initial values and controlled variables. Major note: There are no major areas in the region that lack both wired AND wireless connectivity. We are utilizing a hypothetical area (12 km long) similar to Huff Creek Valley that has neither. 28
Adoption Rate Adoption Rate = Number of Users / Population with Access Also called take-up rate Does not correspond directly to availability. While most addresses have broadband available, adoption rate remains low. District of Columbia - 76% Wyoming Logan Overall 22% 0.16% 9.3% Wireless Only 10% 43% 29% Wireless & Cable/Fiber 67% 55% 60% Total Connected 98% 98% 98% Adoption rate 33% 14% 22% Cable/Fiber Only Adoption rates from Shentel; the exact numbers will vary by ISP. 29
Adoption Rate Reasons West Virginia Survey Results Summary Not receiving speeds as advertised. Unreliable/Spotty High Cost Service Unavailable Source: West Virginia Region 1 Broadband Study Survey (2013) Source: Pew Research Nationwide Survey (2015) 30
Conclusions/Recommendations Broadband has the capability to improve the economic conditions of rural WV Actual Broadband availability needs improvement for some regions Availability is not the primary driver of low adoption rate Continue Cable/Fiber Expansion for higher adoption rate Cell yields lower adoption rate but cheaper to implement Adoption rate of broadband needs to be addressed Training and education Availability of subsidies Poor performance of advertised speeds and services Price point 31
Future Work Focus on adoption rate rather than the availability. Investigate additional subsidies and programs Continue researching other successful broadband initiatives Follow up on emerging technologies 32
Acknowledgements George Mason University Dr. Michael Hieb Dr. Syed Abbas Zaidi Dr. Kathryn Laskey GIS Department Geotel Communications LLC Teri Phares Andrew Bates Eric Cabading Shenandoah Telecommunications (Shentel) Brith Osinkosky Christopher Kyle 33
Questions? 34
Appendix Extra maps Key resources or charts Systems Dynamics model 35
Wired/Wireless Comparison ISP Revenue Wireless Cell Tower Initial Costs = $225K Graph TBD Wired *Using same geographic area to represent the same target population with same initial values 36
Northwest Logan County Analysis 37
Economic Analysis Wired Model 38
Coverage Analysis Wired Data on coverage area from GeoTel, by ISP and connection type: Coaxial cable Fiber Asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) Partial data on fiber/cable lines from Shentel (comparison on right) 500-meter buffer around lines for theoretical coverage area (green) Mostly lines up with GeoTel data (brown and yellow) 500-meter buffer around GeoTel polygons for plausible expansion 39
Coverage Analysis Wireless Main data source: GeoTel Coverage polygons by provider and spectrum (purple transparent polygons, right) Data validation: Elevation data from USGS Cell towers (yellow arrows) from FCC Overlapping viewsheds calculated (green) Very general correlation, but not usefully close Complicating factors: Multi-path Vegetation 40
Actual Cell Coverage - Wyoming County 41
Relationship Link Resources Relationship between broadband adoption and income http://www.nardep.info/uploads/broadbandwhitepaper.pdf https://www.ericsson.com/res/thecompany/docs/corporate-responsibility/2013/impact-of-broadband-speed -on-household-income.pdf Relationship between broadband adoption and Training https://copp-ommunity.asu.edu/sites/default/files/revchicagosmartcommunitieschange042514-final% 20%282%29.pdf Relationship between broadband adoption and employment rates https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/06labor_crandall.pdf Relationship between broadband adoption and Cost https://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/22/does-lowering-the-price-of-broadband-increase-its-use/?_r=1 DC BB Adoption Rates https://connect.dc.gov/publication/dc-broadband-adoption-rates 42