Last month, the United States Department of Defense (DoD) updated its Unified Facilities Criteria (UFC) documents to include Passive Optical LAN deployment guidelines for new construction and renovation requirements. These guidelines can be used for planning, design, construction, sustainment, restoration and modernization of telecom infrastructure. Specifically, the United States Marine Corps included these updates into the UFC; however, any of the DoD services may utilize these new unified guidelines. This means that a single source of requirements is now available for all DoD planners, engineers and installers for the installation of Passive Optical LAN.
With fiber-based Passive Optical LAN, the DoD can fulfill 3 strategic initiatives for both new construction and renovation projects, such as:
1. Positive impact on telecom network and facilities modernization
2. Contributions to green sustainability initiatives, like Green Globe and LEEDs
3. Upgrading antiquated copper-based network to fiber-based networks both LAN and WAN
In addition to those high profile initiatives listed above, there are still more benefits that Passive Optical LAN delivers to the DoD:
1. POL provides the most efficient use of government monetary funds and staff resources
2. Eliminates telecom rooms and lowers energy usage due to less UPS, A/C and ventilation
3. Converges voice, video and data over a single fiber network, reduces cables and saves space
4. Industry leading security and protection, far better than legacy copper-based LANs
5. Simplify and secure the network with fewer devices to provision, monitor, and secure
This is a significant milestone for the Passive Optical LAN industry, and for Tellabs, considering that the Marines, Army, Air Force, Navy and all other DoD entities together represent the largest group of building owners in North America.
