Plastic Optical Fibers in Access Networks

The increasing bandwidth needed by the business and residential users has been a challenge in recent years for telecom operators. For this reason, optical fiber became a candidate to access networks, allowing high transmission rates when compared with copper cable and coaxial cable or even with wireless communication systems. Optical fibers can exist in different materials: glass optical fiber (GOF) and plastic optical fiber (POF).The aim of this paper is to study the use of POF in access network using a simulation software. Two scenarios were taken into account: the first is an implementation of a Gigabit Passive Optical Network (GPON) with GOF and POF and the second scenario consists on the analysis of the performance of POF in an environment where GPON and 10G-PON coexists on the same optical distribution network (ODN). It was observed that POF can be used in access networks but it is only feasible when the ODN attenuation is around 15 dB.