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The Lincolnshire County Council (LCC) in England has launched a new pilot project that aims to address rural broadband “not spots” across the agricultural sector by helping farms deploy Starlink’s satellite based broadband service. If found to be successful, the initiative could be rolled out “across the county” to farms where fibre-based solutions are unlikely to be delivered in the near future.
Starlink currently has around 11,140 satellites in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) – mostly at altitudes of between c.340-550km. Residential users in the UK usually pay from £40 a month for the 100Mbps unlimited data plan, which also promises uploads of c.15-35Mbps and low latency connectivity (c.20ms). Faster packages exist at greater cost, while more restrictive (data capped) options are available for roaming (e.g. £55pm for 100GB of data).
At this point a question arises, if farmers can already purchase Starlink directly then what does LCC’s pilot bring to the table? In short, the pilot will see the council fund the purchase and help to install Starlink facilities on properties without fibre broadband across the council’s County Farms estate. Farmers would then contract directly with Starlink for a subscription package and pay for that part themselves.