The UK telephone network will soon shift away from copper cabling to a fibre optic based network, reliant on electricity supply. This means that during a network outage, vulnerable customers would be unable to call for help.
This project will develop an existing Smart-UPS to deliver and facilitate health-related services to customers in vulnerable situations by enabling multi-day Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) power for phones in the case of prolonged power loss.
A satellite phone will also be developed for remote communities to provide connectivity to the DNO in case of a complete loss of communication in an area. This will provide the option to support individual PSR customers or communities as appropriate to their needs in the event of an outage.
Benefits
Keeping Comms Open is a development project with stage gates that allow the Project Partners to measure the Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) throughout the project life.
The social return on investment (SROI) method for measuring values not traditionally reflected in financial statements, including social, economic, and environmental factors, was utilised to enable a CBA to support this project. The sections used were:
· Reducing Stress during an Outage (£35 Per Customer)
· Customers Feel Better in Control of their Lives (£82.10 Per Customer)
It is assumed that one Smart-UPS device would benefit one customer and that one Community Satellite Phone could benefit 15 customers. This was based on the average size of a small UK village, which has population of around 500. If 3% of customers in a village don’t have a mobile phone, then 15 customers could benefit by having access to a satellite phone. The solution assumes that 14,700 Smart-UPS devices and 480 satellite phones would be deployed to deliver the benefits calculated below. The method for these estimates is shown in section 3.2.3.
14,700 Smart-UPS deployed = 14,700 customers benefitted
480 Community Satellite Phones deployed = 480 x 15 = 7,200 customer benefitted
It is assumed that each customer that receives a device will experience a power cut each year for the benefit of this CBA. This is a worst-case scenario for the reliability of the UK’s distribution network.
(14,700+7,200) customers x (£35 + £82.10) = £2.56m
Total Benefits = £2.56m per year
Learnings
Outcomes
The project is currently in the development and early testing stage. To date, the following progress has been made:
Smart-UPS devices have been developed for in-house testing and trial preparation.
Functional, operational and safety requirements have been defined to support solution development, assessment and future deployment activities.
Customer guidance materials have been produced to support installation, operation and engagement during future trials. In-house trials have been initiated by UK Power Networks to assess device functionality and performance.
Engagement with stakeholders has provided valuable feedback on the community satellite phone concept, resulting in reconsideration of this element of the project.
Collaboration has begun with internal teams to analyse the number of PSR customers potentially affected by the PSTN switch-off, which will inform the identification of suitable trial participants and support the targeting of resilient communication solutions.
Lessons Learnt
The lessons below are summarised based on the collaboration across the project partners in this reporting period.
Early project engagement with stakeholders has highlighted the importance of considering real-world customer behaviour and accessibility during emergency scenarios when designing resilience solutions.
Smart‑UPS initial testing has highlighted the value of iterative design cycles prior to field deployment.
Initial feedback has shown that while community communication devices may offer technical resilience, their effectiveness depends heavily on whether vulnerable customers can realistically and safely access them during extreme weather events.
The project has also highlighted the importance of understanding the scale of customers impacted by the PSTN switch-off, particularly those registered on the Priority Services Register (PSR).
