From January 2023, “on our mobile network, the only network in France to have emergency batteries on its antennas, a cut of more than 20 minutes will cause the service to drop” indicates Orange, which specifies: “After this period of 20 minutes, and during the entire time of the outage, phoning, sending SMS or using any application requiring an internet connection will be impossible. »
And once the cut is over, 15 to 20% of the antennas will require a manual restart. “80 to 85% of our mobile antennas will be restarted automatically and autonomously. The rest of our antennas requiring the intervention of a technician to be reactivated, the return to normal could take a little longer in certain areas”, specifies the operator.
On the fixed telephony side, the massive installation of internet boxes that offer a telephone/internet/television connection to individuals and businesses is also a problem. Because these phones are connected to the boxes, which are powered. So the cut will affect both the box and the telephone.
Everyone has a T-plug, but no one has the right phone anymore
Admittedly, most homes are still equipped with the famous “T” socket of the copper network. But few people still use it, and have a proper phone. And on the internet side, you will have understood, the worst is yet to come. No box, no internet, no Wi-Fi during the cut.
“Finally, if you use remote assistance or remote monitoring services, they will be unavailable for the duration of the load shedding, since they depend on your connectivity (fixed or mobile)”, indicates Orange. Say goodbye to video surveillance systems.
And the operator specifies that on the business side, only customers “having batteries for the Livebox Pro (between 2h and 12h of autonomy) as well as a generator supplying their premises will be able to have telephone and internet services” .
The RRF network, an MVNO on the Orange infrastructure
At the end of November, Christel Heydemann, installed for eight months at the head of Orange, had declared during a hearing in the Senate that it would be “illusory to think that there will be no impact for customers in the event power cut”.
“Unfortunately, telecom networks are not considered to be priority sites,” she added. Christel Heydemann had also insisted on the fact that the backup systems could suffer from this situation.
By emergency systems, we of course mean emergency numbers such as 15, 18, 17 (which were designed to operate on the fixed network), or even 112. But also the new virtualized networks used by law enforcement.
Suffice to say that this energy crisis situation falls very badly, while France is preparing to deploy the RRF network (Radio Network of the Future). RRF is a communication network for law enforcement and emergency services that will use Orange’s 4G network. It must supplement and then supplant aging dedicated physical networks that do not provide the same wealth of services as 4G.
“Telecommunications operators undertake to maintain the operation of their network for a power outage of a maximum of two hours. Beyond that, there is no notion of continuity of service,” says communication systems expert Francis di Giorgio, who worked on the design of radio networks for firefighters and SAMU.
“Christel Heydemann’s speech in the Senate is a way for Orange to protect itself if the RRF cannot provide emergency services”, he analyzes. “She tells the State that it is not its responsibility if the emergency services go through an MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator, editor’s note) which uses a consumer network. »
More services, but more energy
Until the gradual implementation of communications for law enforcement and emergency services on 4G networks, the latter used radio networks (Acropol for the National Police or Rubis for the National Gendarmerie) which allowed between 24 hours and 48 hours of autonomy, with 12 V batteries, in the event of a power cut.
The migration to RRF began with the deployment of 22,000 smartphones and tablets equipped with the Neopol (for the police) and Neogend (for the gendarmerie) applications, which use Orange’s 4G and GSM network. The deployment began last April for certain units such as the CRS and the Brav-M.
The firefighters and the SAMU should also go in this direction in the long term.
“We are therefore switching to networks that operate on 220 V,” says Francis di Giorgio, with the power requirements that this entails. “The gendarmerie has kept the Rubis network, and I think that with the current situation they will continue to use it for a while. »