Alcatel Powers Canada's AltaLink

PARIS -- Alcatel (Paris: CGEP.PA and NYSE: ALA) has today announced the completion of a multiservice network integrating data and voice services for AltaLink, a electricity transmission company in Alberta, Canada, responsible for almost 60 per cent of the province's electrical transmission requirements. Relying on its 99.999 per cent field-proven reliability, AltaLink is deploying the Alcatel 3600 MainStreet Multiservice Bandwith Manager plus the Alcatel 7470 Multiservice Platform to aggregate mission critical "teleprotection" circuits, the data circuits that provide automatic protection of transmission lines and terminal stations across the power grid. In addition, the network delivers voice, data and control services between AltaLink's operations centre and remote electrical substations. The network also includes the Alcatel 1603 SMX, which delivers next generation, multiservice SONET in an extremely compact footprint. Finally, the entire solution will be managed end-to-end by the Alcatel 5620 Network Manager. "Standardizing our network on the Alcatel MainStreet and edge platform ensures the dedicated, secure, high-speed communication for the teleprotection and control for all of the 500, 240 and major 138 kV transmission lines and substations owned by AltaLink," said Richard Hird, principal engineer Telecommunication and SCADA for AltaLink. "Alcatel provides our network with a cost-effective solution while giving us the capacity required, the ability to address future additions to support forecasted transmission system expansion, the flexibility to incorporate ongoing development in digital technologies and the ability to monitor and manage the telecommunications network from a central location." Alcatel SA