Public Protection and Disaster Relief – Transformation Centre
The PPDR-TC project was funded under the EU FP7 programme from April 2013 to September 2015 and involved 10 project partners.
A significant amount of network capacity needs to be available throughout the disaster and affected areas to support effective Public Protection and Disaster Relief (PPDR) communications where mobility is the main requirement. At the very early response stages voice communications are critical, after which non-voice communications are an important requirement dependent on the nature of the disaster.
As most mobile telecommunications networks located in a disaster area are designed to support normal traffic loads, they will not have the capacity to provide effective PPDR communications. As disasters require effective co-ordination, support and communication between all agencies involved, it would be ideal if one communication solution could be provided to meet all needs.
Radio communications networks used by public safety and the emergency services will normally be used to provide Public Protection. Most public safety organisations have the capability to rapidly deploy mobile communications network elements to provide additional capacity and/or maintain communications if the main network fails. As the trend in parts of Europe is to allow non-public safety organisations that could be involved in major emergencies and disasters to operate on the same networks as used by public safety organisations, it is reasonable that provision could be made on these networks to Disaster Relief (DR) agencies.
The goal of PPDR-TC is to specify an interoperable, secure and resilient voice and data communications architecture, tailored specifically for the needs of the PPDR community. It will provide the foundation for the evolution of mission critical communications. PPDR-TC will address both mission critical and non-mission critical situations in an integrated and uniform way. Enable ubiquitous secure communications over dedicated and commercial networks. PPDR-TC will investigate and propose optimal scenarios to merge commercial broadband infrastructure with current PPDR systems