Battery boost: Farmers call for 12hr mobile tower blackout backup

Despite significant funds being available to top telecommunication providers, regional mobile users are still losing reception in times of danger.

Tower power: The latest Regional Telecommunications Review is calling for more funding to boost mobile tower battery backup.

Battery backup remains at just two to four hours on the vast majority of the nation’s 14,000 mobile phone towers, leaving many communities without communication in the wake of major storm, fire and flood-induced blackouts.

Telstra, Optus and TPG have tapped into the Federal Government’s $37.1 million Strengthening Telecommunications Against Natural Disasters (STAND) package, to boost battery backup on 467 mobile phone towers to 12 hours.

But BlazeAid founder Kevin Butler said the number of upgrades to date was pitiful and what was needed was a major five to 10-year funding commitment to boosting battery backup capacity, especially in areas of high bushfire risk.

“It’s after about 2hrs that people are waking up to the fact the fire is getting bigger and bigger,” Mr Butler said. “That’s the time they need it (mobile reception).”

A Telstra tower out in the bush.

National Farmers’ Federation telecommunications chair Peter Thompson said the Federal Government’s latest 2021 Regional Telecommunications Review was released last week, which recommended extending the STAND program in areas with “frequent power outages, particularly those at risk of natural disaster”.

Mr Butler said the loss of mobile reception occurred time and again during fires, meaning “you’re on your own”, especially on catastrophic days when the mercury hits 40 degrees and strong northerly winds set in.

That fact was reinforced again this summer when Mr Butler said mobile reception was lost during the Western Australian fires and closer to home during the New Year’s Eve Poolaijelo blaze, southwest of Edenhope.

Poolaijelo sheep and cattle producer Celia Scott, who had 240ha of her family’s farm burnt out in the blaze, said as soon as the fire hit it became impossible to download critical weather reports, which then degenerated to the point where they lost mobile and landline reception.

Blackouts: A tower at Culla, Victoria. Picture: Supplied

Won Wron farmer Paul Mumford said communication was an essential service that had to be maintained during natural disasters.

Just how essential became all too clear to the United Dairyfarmers of Victoria president and his neighbours in June last year when storms cut power, leaving them without mobile or landline reception as tower batteries ran flat within a couple of hours and the local Yarram exchange flooded.

“We had to jump in the car and drive 16kms to get reception,” Mr Mumford said.

Telstra Regional Australia executive Loretta Willaton said mobile base stations battery backup was designed to maintain services for a few hours, not extended power outages.

Optus has upgraded 56 mobile tower sites with battery back-up capacity of 12hrs, but was also rolling out critical power extenders to 150 other sites, which provided 10-20 hours of power if the grid went down.