Renewable energy supplies for radio systems for servicing rural customers

BT has used solar powered equipment for about 18 years, and there are three such known installations in the UK local access network (all powering single channel radio sets). However, these are all very low powered applications (average consumption less than 1 W), and can be satisfied from a modest sized solar panel float-charging a small battery. This paper describes a further example, from the BT telephone network, where a customer was supplied with a radio system with very much higher power consumption, and which was powered successfully by a renewable energy source