Restack of digital TV services completed

Broadcast Australia, a member of the BAI Group, has successfully completed the process of clearing digital television services within the Spectrum Restack Program from the Digital Dividend band (694-820 MHz) on behalf of the Commonwealth.

On 20 November, as the sun rose over Canberra, ABC and SBS services at Black Mountain Tower were retuned and in the afternoon all television services in Gunning changed frequency. These retunes marked the completion of the entire Restack Program and concluded the final step in clearing the spectrum for new telecommunications services as contracted by the Commonwealth to Broadcast Australia.

“This was an incredibly complex project with numerous stakeholders and very tight time frames,” said Jim Hassell, Group CEO of BAI. “The original plan was for 180 sites to be retuned over three years, but it quickly expanded to 426 sites to be delivered in less than two years.

“Our world-leading team met this monumental challenge head on; I’m extraordinarily proud of them, and to have worked with the Commonwealth Government on a project of this magnitude, delivering the Restack both within budget and ahead of the official time frame,” added Hassell. “I would like to acknowledge the financial and other support received from the Commonwealth along with the enormous support received from the commercial broadcast industry that made this possible.”

The digital dividend

In June 2010, the government announced that a digital dividend of 126 MHz of “700 MHz” band spectrum, comprising UHF television channels 52 to 69, would be realised. Creating this digital dividend would be possible following the move to digital-only television broadcasting under the digital television switchover program (completed in December 2013).

In 2012, Broadcast Australia was appointed to be the Program Implementation Manager to plan and coordinate the implementation of the Restack. The government’s 700 MHz spectrum Digital Dividend auction, which took place in May 2013, netted approximately $1.9 billion from telecommunications companies Optus Mobile and Telstra. At this auction, the spectrum was to be made available by 1 January 2015. The Restack Program completed their clearance works six weeks prior to this deadline.

At each affected site, technicians needed to replace, retune or otherwise modify transmission equipment to enable channel changes to occur. The work undertaken equated to 346,000 hours (or 192 man years), arguably the biggest ever change in the broadcast industry in this country; put another way, it was the equivalent of delivering the 15-year DTV rollout for all broadcasters in three years.

The Restack Program of works has involved changing the frequencies of approximately 1250 national and commercial digital television channels across Australia at 373 transmission sites. These changes caused consequential input changes at a further 53 sites, bringing the total sites where work was required to 426.

Additionally, Broadcast Australia conducted safety training (to Federal Safety Commission standards), delivering Work, Health & Safety and Technical training to all workers involved in the project.

Future television

The successful conclusion of the Restack Program delivers the government’s goal of freeing spectrum for use in the cellular network to provide capacity for the proliferation of data-rich mobile devices. At the same time it enhances the television experience with more channels offering greater choice and higher quality output both now with High Definition pictures and sound and for the future with technologies such as Ultra High Definition TV (also known as 4K TV).

“While the completion of this project cements our engineering and delivery expertise, at its heart this was about creating new options and opportunities for consumers from as early as next year as the cleared spectrum allows for the release of the latest telecommunications technology to support the latest communication trends,” said Hassell.

Hassell noted that this is yet another success for the company which manages diverse communications infrastructure projects in the United States, Canada, Australia and Hong Kong.