Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 19 October 2021
254. Deputy Christopher O'Sullivan asked the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications if he will investigate the possibility of National Broadband Ireland producing a rolling 12-month plan for broadband connection within the Cork south-west region; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51328/21]
View answerThe National Broadband Plan (NBP) State led Intervention will be delivered by National Broadband Ireland (NBI) under a contract to roll out a high speed and future proofed broadband network within the Intervention Area which covers 1.1 million people living and working in the over 544,000 premises, including almost 100,000 businesses and farms along some 699 schools. The NBP roll out is currently a 7 year plan under the contract and deployment is due to be complete by the end of 2026. The network rollout for the National Broadband Plan is divided into 227 Deployment Areas (DAs) across the country. These are typically an area of approximately 25km in radius and in total they cover 96% of Ireland’s landmass. The architecture of the network design is specifically based on the design of the NBI network coming from the eir exchanges or the metropolitan area networks (MANs). It is based on an engineering design that allows NBI to get to every premises as quickly as possible working within the confines of how fibre networks are built.
Each DA creates a ‘fibre ring’ which is essential to ensure reliability, robustness and resilience. Critical to the success of the network, NBI’s fibre rings are built with back-ups, ensuring that in the event of one fibre cable being disrupted, the whole network continues to perform. Each fibre ring that NBI deploys is designed in a way that is non-discriminatory, meaning that as the rollout progresses, it may pass relatively urban areas at the same time as passing some of the most remote premises within the intervention area. The design will utilise existing infrastructure to a very significant degree.
There are over 80,000 premises in the Intervention Area in County Cork that will receive access to high speed broadband under the National Broadband Plan. Government investment in County Cork in the NBP will be in the order of €314 million. I am advised by National Broadband Ireland that, as of 7 October, almost 26,000 premises in County Cork have been surveyed. In total, almost 267,000 premises across all counties have been surveyed, with 113,000 premises are under construction across 30 Deployment Areas. More than 27,000 premises can order or pre-order a connection in Counties Cork, Cavan Galway, Limerick and Monaghan.
Further details are available on specific areas in Co Cork through the NBI website, www.nbi.ie, which provides a facility for any premises within the intervention area to register their interest in being provided with deployment updates. Individuals who register with this facility will receive regular updates on progress by NBI on delivering the network and specific updates related to their own premises as works commence. I am advised that while the details of the full deployment plan are available on the NBI website, a rolling 24 month update which provides a 3 to 6 month window for indicative service activation dates is specifically provided.
