Latest NBN lottery reveals Australian homes set to receive new fibre-to-the-curb connection

Updated

We knew hundreds of thousands of additional homes were set to receive the NBN's latest technology.

Now we know which ones.

NBN Co updated its website this week to reveal which 440,000 homes are to be the latest recipients of its fast, new fibre-to-the-curb (kerb) connections, also known as FTTC.

Due to the complicated nature of the changes, NBN Co has not provided an exhaustive list of updated locations.

The ABC has confirmed some of the neighbourhoods affected, including:

NSW: Parts of Dee Why, Granville, Parramatta, Rooty Hill and Tweed Heads

Vic: Parts of Bayswater, Greensborough, Lilydale and Werribee

Queensland: Parts of Cleveland, Springfield and Waterford

SA: Parts of Hampstead, Paradise, Salisbury and Norwood

WA: Parts of Ellenbrook, Henley Brook, The Vines

Close NBN watchers have also identified more changes.



Why the changes?

Some of the new FTTC connections have been shifted over from fibre-to-the-node — the technology adopted by the Turnbull Government to speed up the rollout, but which can limit users' speeds.

FTTC, for which NBN Co has adopted the American spelling of "kerb", involves technicians replacing more of the old cabling between your home and the internet with fibre optic cable.

It has been introduced in the past year as the technology has become cheaper to deliver.

FTTC allows homes far away from network 'nodes' — often in semi-rural locations — to obtain fast speeds where previously they would have relied on long stretches of the old copper lines.

However most changes revealed this week are in areas previously marked to receive NBN via hybrid fibre coaxial (HFC) connections — that is, using the old pay TV networks.

The HFC rollout had been paused last year following high fault rates.

In announcing the website update, NBN Co chief executive Bill Morrow said his team continued to innovate to deliver the rollout, "as quickly and affordably as possible".

"The flexibility of the multi-technology mix allows us to choose the right technology for each area and deliver the project on time and on budget," he said.

"We remain confident of reaching our goal of completing the build and connecting 8 million Australian premises by 2020."

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull last week conceded there was a threat to the NBN from new 5G networks and confirmed billions in public investment in the rollout is unlikely to be recovered.

"When I became communications minister back in 2013, I said the Labor party had wasted $20 billion on the NBN, which I don't think you can recover. You're asking me what the NBN will be worth if it is sold in five or six years' time — I can't forecast that," he told radio station 3AW.

"But is there a threat from wireless services including 5G? Yes, there is at the margin.

"But the amount of bandwidth that people are using, principally for video streaming, is so enormous and growing so fast. I think the ability of wireless networks to take over is probably overstated, but time will tell."

The website update also includes new information on when tens of thousands of homes still set to receive HFC will be able to connect to the NBN.

Topics: government-and-politics, internet-technology, computers-and-technology, internet-culture, information-and-communication, australia

First posted