edotco installs Myanmar’s first bamboo telecom tower

Details: Vaughan O'Grady; Category: Wireless Networks; 22 November 2019; 6077 views

You wouldn’t necessarily describe it as unobtrusive, but Mynmar’s first telecom tower constructed from bamboo, which has been installed in Thanlyin, a major port city, is certainly sustainable.

The structure was built by telecommunications infrastructure services company edotco in partnership with Yangon Technological University (YTU) as an extension of what edotco calls its continued commitment to sustainable telecommunications infrastructure.

“A lot of research went into identifying the right local bamboo to be used for constructing these structures,” said Vijendran Watson, chief regional office, Bay of Bengal, edotco Group. “The usage of bamboo in constructing towers is set to reduce our dependence on steel by 80 percent and decrease 70 percent of the carbon footprint per site.”

Bamboo is readily available in Myanmar. It makes an ideal material for a load-bearing telecom structure; studies indicate that untreated bamboo is capable of bearing the weight of concrete while possessing rigidity and tensile strength. It can also withstand gusts of up to 195km/h and is a great deal lighter than steel structures, easing deployment and reducing the load to buildings.

The structure has the potential capacity to house up to two tenants at a time. With proper maintenance, bamboo has an expected lifespan of approximately 10 years.

edotco Group operates and manages a regional portfolio of over 29,900 towers across its core markets of Malaysia, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, the Philippines and Laos. It deployed the world’s first bamboo tower in Dhaka, Bangladesh in 2017, and has since deployed a total of 16 bamboo structures.