Rural broadband, the necessity to bring the country online, has been compared to the electrification of rural Ireland. And the Government’s solution is the National Broadband Plan (NBP), which promises to provide high-speed internet to areas of the country where the commercial sector won’t invest in on its own.

Irish Country Living has been monitoring the scheme closely, given the impact it will have on our readers. The NBP will service 96% of the country’s land mass, 100,000km of road and 1.8m citizens. In all, 94% of farms, 40% of primary schools (especially rural schools) and 63,440 non-farm businesses such as SMEs, B&Bs, shops and clinics will eventually benefit.

The Government announced last week that an extra 170,000 premises will be covered under the NBP. Where did this figure come from?

Until now, those 170,000 premises where included in the “blue” areas of the Government’s intervention map, meaning they would be serviced by the commercial sector.

The rollout of those services has been monitored closely, and it has emerged that investment in these 170,000 premises has not materialised, with no concrete alternative investment plans from the sector for these areas. As a result, broadband will now be provided to them under the NBP.

Q. My home is in the blue area but I still don’t have high-speed broadband. How will I know if I am one of these 170,000 properties?

A. If there is a plan between now and the end of this year to enable your exchange or your exchange has already been enabled and you’re not getting the service you need, you should contact the Department of Communications by emailing your post code to broadband@dcenr.gov.ie.

They will be able to tell you if there is a commercial plan to deliver the services you need, or if you will now be getting broadband through the NBP. Anyone can access the intervention map at broadband.gov.ie, where you can enter your eircode or address to find your premises and to see what zone you are in.

Q. If my broadband is now going to provided by the NBP, won’t that be a massive delay for me?

A. Unfortunately, you will be waiting longer. It is envisioned that the contract will be awarded by summer 2017 and the rollout should start shortly afterwards. However, the NBP is already running six months behind its original schedule, so it may take longer. The good news is if you are in the blue area, there is a good chance you will be one of the first serviced.

This is purely due to location. The NBP is building out from the existing network and those in the blue area are near that anyway, so they will be serviced in the early stages of the roll out.

Q. I’m not near an existing network. I live in rural Mayo. Because these 170,000 premises are going to be serviced first, will this delay when I will get high-speed broadband?

A. Not necessarily. This was the question Irish Country Living put to Minister for Communications Denis Naughten TD and he explained: “Let’s say, for example, the existing network goes to Lucan, and Leixlip was in a blue area. Then we find areas of Leixlip don’t have high-speed broadband and won’t by the end of this year.

“However, in order to service the people of Maynooth, we would have had to go from the existing network in Lucan and out through Leixlip anyway. So in relation to the build out, we don’t see it making a real difference, both in terms of logistics and cost.”

Q. Until now Minister Naughten has been firmly of the view that this broadband infrastructure should remain in public ownership. Why did the government opt for a different model?

A. Last week, it was decided in Cabinet that the NBP would adopt a gap funding model, which will see a company from the private sector finance, build, own and operate the network with contractual obligations to the department. After 25 years, they will fully own it.

This differs to the alternative full concession model, which would have seen the Government being in possession of the network in 2042.

When it came down to the wire, the Government opted for the gap funding model for two reasons. Firstly, between €500m and €600m would have been needed within the next six years. To do that, it would mean pulling funding from areas such as housing and homelessness, health and climate action, all of which are key priorities.

Furthermore, it would also have cost somewhere between 50% and 70% more, to go for the full concession model, and a lot of that would be due to legal costs. The NBP is building out from existing networks that already belongs to the private sector. Who would own what would lead to a lot of legal debate. Not only would this have added cost, it would have also pushed out the roll-out by at least six months.

Q. So who exactly is going to build this infrastructure?

A. There is a tendering process going on at the moment to decide that. It is now down to three companies who are in the running: Eir, Siro and E-net. Gigabit Fibre and Imagine fell from the race last week.