Staff photo by Connor Cummiskey New Ulm Telecom received $736,598 from the state for two projects expanding broadband access near Hanska and in rural White Rock. The grants were through the Border-to-Border Rural Broadband Grant program.

NEW ULM — Two grants NU-Telecom received from the state help speed along expansions to rural broadband.

The company received funding for two out of five projects it applied for through the Border-to-Border Broadband Grant program from the Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED).

“I think it is crucial, especially on a more timely basis,” CEO and President Bill Otis said. “In some cases it would be hard to justify the build without the grants so you end up a little bit with the haves and the have-nots. I would not say that these customers would never get it, but it would be farther down the road.”

NU-Telecom received funding for last-mile (connecting consumers to a central hub) expansions in rural White Rock and Hanska. Three other expansions that did not receive grants were located northeast of New Ulm, north of Springfield and northeast of Hutchinson.

The grants only cover part of the cost of each project. The White Rock grant covers $411,704 of a $914,898 project and the Hanska grant covers $324,894 of a $721,988 project.

Both funded projects will expand fiber optic cables, extremely thin fibers of transparent glass or silica that are faster than copper wires.

Combined, the grants bring the cost for NU-Telecom down from over $1.6 million to $900,288.

Grant projects like Border-to-Border are aimed at reducing expansion costs, which deters installation of rural broadband networks.

“The biggest problem is the cost,” Otis said. “When all of the sudden you are looking at $20,000-$30,000 a mile for fiber optic facilities, when you do not have any density — you do not have many farm places, many homes to buy (Internet access) — it gets terribly expensive on a per-customer basis to get fiber in.”

A fair portion of NU-Telecom’s network is still copper wire. While copper is slower, as long as the fiber is close to the customer, no further than about 2,000 feet, the customer will still see the boost of broadband speeds around 100 megabits-per-second, Otis said.

For reference, the minimum speeds for being considered “served” is an upload speed of 25 megabits-per-second and a download speed of 3 megabits-per-second.

“We have an awful lot of fiber that is already deployed, but not a lot of fiber that is going directly to customers,” Otis said.

Most of that fiber is in the so-called middle mile that connects different communities or hubs, he said.

In New Ulm likely no customer is over 4,000 feet away from a fiber optic cable and the average is probably 2,000 feet, Otis said. Outside the city, however, farms can be miles away from fiber optics.

The projects are expected to be implemented sometime in 2018. The exact window is still loose as the company is working on lining up contractors and other early details, Otis said.

Connor Cummiskey can be emailed at ccummiskey@nujournal.com.