science

National broadband plan

National broadband plan is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand National broadband plan rather than just read about it. In short: A national broadband plan is a national plan to deploy broadband Internet access. Broadband is a term normally considered to be synonymous with a high-speed connection to the internet.

Key takeaways

National broadband plan belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect National broadband plan to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of National broadband plan from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

A national broadband plan is a national plan to deploy broadband Internet access. Broadband is a term normally considered to be synonymous with a high-speed connection to the internet. Suitability for certain applications, or technically a certain quality of service, is often assumed. For instance, low round trip delay (or "latency" in milliseconds) would normally be assumed to be well under 150ms and suitable for Voice over IP, online gaming, international financial transactions, virtual private networks and other latency-sensitive applications. This would rule out satellite Internet as inherently high-latency. In some applications, utility-grade reliability (measured for example in seconds per 30 years outage time as in the PSTN network) or security (say AES-128 as required for smart grid applications in the US) are often also assumed or defined as requirements. There is no single definition of broadband and official plans may refer to any or none of these criteria. Beyond broad latency and reliability expectations, the term itself is technology neutral; broadband can be delivered by a range of technologies including DSL, fiber optic cable, powerline networking, LTE, Ethernet, Wi-Fi or next generation access. Several operators have started to combine two of these technologies to create Hybrid Access Networks. This article presents an overview of official government plans to promote broadband – based on official sources that may be biased due to their promotion of the government plan as effective and positive. Such plans are recommended by OECD and other development agencies. All G7 countries except Canada have such a national broadband plan in place now.

Comparisons Most countries considering such plans conduct their own comparative evaluations of existing national plans. The US, for instance, in September 2010 published a comparison of seven other countries' plans. The OECD tracks closely policy in this area and publishes links to relevant policy documents from its member (developed) countries. Developing countries' plans are studied most closely by the World Bank as part of its e-Development program. It has released the World Bank Broadband Strategy Toolkit to assist in policy development. Furthermore, the close relationship of universal wired broadband and smart grid plans is the subject of much study particularly in the US and Europe. The US plan has ambitious energy demand management goals (see National Broadband Plan (United States) for more details on these and their relationship to other US national goals) and its broadband plan is generally considered to be a pre-requisite to its communications-intensive energy strategy. This is also true to some degree of other countries' broadband plans.

Americas

Northern America

Canada

As of early March 2009, colleagues in Industry Canada confirm that the current national broadband strategy is a short statement in the 2009 budget: "Canada was one of the first countries to implement a connectivity agenda geared toward facilitating Internet access to all of its citizens. To this day, Canada remains one of the most connected nations in the world, with the highest broadband connection rate among the G7 countries. However, gaps in access to broadband remain, particularly in rural and remote communities. "The Government is committed to closing the broadband gap in Canada by encouraging the private development of rural broadband infrastructure. Budget 2009 provides $225 million over three years to Industry Canada to develop and implement a strategy on extending broadband coverage to all currently unserved communities beginning in 2009–10." The budget specifically includes: "Providing $225 million over three years to develop and implement a strategy on extending broadband coverage to unserved communities." On 6 March 2009, Mr. John Duncan, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and Federal Interlocutor for Métis and Non-status Indians, announced that the Government of Canada will contribute $7.86 million to the First Nations Emergency Services Society (FNESS) and their partner, the First Nations Technology Council (FNTC) in British Columbia, for the construction and provision of satellite broadband network capacity connecting 21 remote First Nations communities in British Columbia. In a 4 June 2009 news release, the CRTC endorsed the National Film Board's call for a national digital strategy. No substantial action, followup or funding was announced in the 2010 or 2011 budgets. CANARIE remains Canada's only publicly funded backbone network. Several provinces, especially Nova Scotia, have their own plans for broadband universal service see Broadband for Rural Nova Scotia initiative but these are generally last-mile services using fixed wireless technologies (Motorola Canopy in the case of Nova Scotia). No province is covered with public backhaul available to general public & business, though some provinces, regions and municipalities own some fiber.

United States

In the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 – popularly referred to as a post-recession stimulus package – Congress charged the US Federal Communications Commission with creating a national broadband plan. The Recovery Act required the plan to explore several key elements of broadband deployment and use, and the commission now seeks comment on these elements, including:

The most effective and efficient ways to ensure broadband access for all Americans Strategies for achieving affordability and maximum utilization of broadband infrastructure and services Evaluation of the status of broadband deployment, including the progress of related grant programs How to use broadband to advance consumer welfare, civic participation, public safety and homeland security, community development, health care delivery, energy independence and efficiency, education, worker training, private sector investment, entrepreneurial activity, job creation, and economic growth, and other national purposes. The plan was published in March 2010, on the same website used to gather public comment during its preparation. The plan is integrated with the US smart grid policies. A major purpose of the broadband plan is to enable M2M communications for that purpose.

Latin America and the Caribbean

Argentina

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with National broadband plan

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what National broadband plan claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to National broadband plan before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about National broadband plan ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of National broadband plan

In research: National broadband plan appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses National broadband plan in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: National broadband plan is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Broadband, International telecommunications, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for National broadband plan outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

Ask Teacher Smith questions about this articleOpens your AI tutor with a question about “National broadband plan” →

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study National broadband plan in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what National broadband plan means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain National broadband plan out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is National broadband plan in simple terms?

A national broadband plan is a national plan to deploy broadband Internet access. Broadband is a term normally considered to be synonymous with a high-speed connection to the internet.

Why does National broadband plan matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study National broadband plan?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on National broadband plan.