A private regional airport wants to bolster their perimeter intrusion sensors and augment them with video surveillance. A college wants to extend its video system to cover more of its student footpaths around its bucolic campus while also providing improved Wi-Fi access. A factory wants to install emergency call boxes and video coverage across its extensive parking lots.
Until recently, all of these cases represented situations that required an extensive construction project to install power, communication cables, and the necessary electrical and electronic equipment. Installed system designers and installers also had to cope with limited distances for data transmission – typically limited to 100 meters – and a range of diverse power requirements.
Today, advances in video cameras and other networkable endpoints have reduced the need for 120V power at these endpoints, increased the ability of devices to accept a range of DC power inputs, and improved their networking capabilities. Coupling these advances with new Power Over Ethernet, or PoE, standards that support higher wattage implementation has given the management at airports, colleges, and every other large facility or organization new options for meeting their safety and security objectives.
Only Two Needs: Power and IP Connectivity
As suggested by the examples above, there can be a wide range of desired electronic endpoints that could be applied to address organizational security goals. A primary example is video cameras, but in a broader sense, many additional devices could also be part of a security solution, including Wi-Fi network access points, intrusion and occupancy sensors, such as vibration and infrared sensors, data capture points, such as card readers, keypads, and RFID readers, and communication devices, such as emergency call boxes, just to name a few.
All of these devices can be part of a security solution, and all of these have another important thing in common: they all only require two things to operate – power and sufficient IP network connectivity. Which brings us to why the new PoE standards are so important – they have allowed manufacturers to design a large number of diverse endpoint devices that can be powered by a single network cable connection that can carry both IP network data and DC power in a voltage that can be used by this diverse set of devices.
Extending Connection Distances
Based on these new standards, leading power system providers have developed centralized power supplies that can provide high wattage PoE power, as well as innovative repeater devices that can extend the useful data transmission over longer distances than ever before. For example, while the 100m maximum distance for UTP Ethernet has not changed since the late ‘80s, great strides have been made in increasing the range using fiber optic cables. Fiber can provide great distances for 10/100/1000 Ethernet connections, with 50-micron OM3 laser-optimized fiber links rated for up to 550 meters (1804 feet) by the IEEE PoE standards. Single-mode links can readily connect devices at distances over 3280 feet from the head-end to the remote device. These longer distances allow for surveillance and security systems to be installed over wide areas, such as airport perimeters, without requiring 120V electrical power.
Advantages of the PoE and IP Approach
There are several significant business and organizational benefits to be gained from using this approach for adding security functionality over greater distances. First and foremost, this approach allows for greatly expanded coverage areas while decreasing the cost of that installation. It also provides for greater routing flexibility because the additional transmission distances allow for routing around obstacles and/or taking advantage of convenient routing pathways, even if those pathways are not direct. And none of these installations will require 120V power to be available at the remote locations for the system to operate.
The equipment and installation costs can be reduced further with the use of environmentally hardened PoE switches, that can be connected back to the head end with a single composite/hybrid cable (made with both fiber and copper conductors) but that can distribute power and connectivity to multiple endpoint devices and even to additional switches.
It is also important to note that this approach also offers additional benefits based on the use of centralized power. Branches of the safety/security system over these extended distances are still powered by the central head-end power supplies, which allows for central power backup with the use of UPS units or backup batteries. And, centralized power allows for both local and remote power monitoring, which can be used for reporting and audit purposes, as well as to alert management to operational issues and enable some centralized remedial actions, such as remotely resetting devices.
In summary, modern PoE and IP capabilities offer new capabilities, cost savings, and flexibility to facility and organizational management to meet their safety and security objectives.
About the Author:
Ronnie Pennington is the National Sales Engineer for Altronix. He is an experienced Sales Engineer with a demonstrated history of working in the electrical and electronic manufacturing industry. He graduated from Marine Corps Communications-Electronics School.
