Power co is going to bury power lines from the road to our new house...roughly 750ft.   We currently do not have any type of internet...cable, fiber, etc in the area.   In the future when those services show up how will they get that service to the house?   Can they use the existing conduit that houses the power lines to run internet service?   I am also having water lines added from the street to the house as well.   Could I use the same trench and add some PVC pipe for future services?  

I have these questions going to the contractor as well.

I believe electrical lines need a dedicated pipe. If the trench is open just run another conduit for future lines.

ETA: water lines are typically run much deeper. At least in NH.

Yeah, they won't be burying the UG line in conduit, especially for 750 feet. If YOU put in conduit under a drive they will likely run it through that.

Ask the power co if there is a possibility of doing a joint trench with the telephone, cable, internet etc. It'll save you some coin.

I would put them in the air if i had the choice.  Plan where you want your future services to enter the house and route the electrical trench accordingly.

Electric will probably be direct burial wire. You will have to bury it at a different depth then other services.  Either deeper, or shallower.



When I did direct burial to my barn, I did water at 5 feet and electrical at 3 feet.


If you want to run conduit for other uses, I'd expect a wider trench.  Do water the deepest, electrical after that, then run your conduits off to the side, as far away from the electrical as possible. Maybe even in a separate ditch all together.  Make sure to run a string in the conduit as you put it together.

At 750', any spare future use conduit better have a couple evenly spaced j boxes .  Probably not worth it.  If you ever get cable out there they will direct bury a cable 10" down.

Run extra conduit while trench is open.

Bury a spool of direct burial RG11 and Ethernet.
The cable company will probably do the coax for free while the trench is open.

Call and ask what your power companies specifications are.

I am an distribution designer for a power company in Texas and we run everything in conduit, that the homeowner or developer puts in their-self per our specification.

Water is always above electric and only allow 2" water line or smaller. The theory is that water usually breaks and needs to be dug up more often that power.

Telco is allowed in a joint trench with 12" of separation

Hang on, that's going to be primary voltage at that distance.

OP, are they are putting a transformer at the end of the ditch?

We are spending millions here to replace all direct bury primary that faults regularly after a few decades. Everything goes in conduit now. Might be different where you are.

Yes..one of the green boxes

We didn't have DSL or other wired internet when my house was built. Power was run underground from the transformer to the house. The phone landline came from a different pole and was in a different trench.

Last year when uverse came to the area, they ran a separate line to yet another pole and used one of those little vibratory plow things to run that line.

Whomever thought it was a good idea to direct bury cable was an idiot

if something goes bad you have to dig up the whole damn line to replace it, yards, sidewalks, roads...

At least with conduit, you usually only get dig-ins that cause you to have to dig a section up, or a crushed conduit if construction is going on. Much better when that cable starts going bad around the 20 year mark.

Personally, I'd be wary of burying phone/cable/internet lines in the same vicinity as my underground power line. Our line is buried and about every 2-3 years we experience a break in the line that warrants the electricity company coming out with a backhoe and digging a decent sized hole to affect a repair to our electrical line. I'd hate to have the power company come out and dig up and break the phone line just to get at the power cable.

This. The big excuse around here was life expectancy. How they were unsure what it would be. Well either way you knew it wasn't lasting forever.

The local phone company just upgraded the area I live in to fiber optic, they used D8 dozers and put tubing in the ground for 3 miles on the neighboring ranch.  When they got to the ranch gate they directionally bored the tubing for a mile at 8 feet deep to avoid an existing buried power line and one of the ranch water lines.

Or you could dig up and repair the fault and not have to replace the entire line

someones not concerned about reliability

This, you just put cable in below the top soil usually.

Make a note of where they run it just so you have a good idea for later.

If they have extra footage, don't let them put a giant loop in the middle of the yard either, or some guy might be pounding a grade stake for a job later, far away from where the cable box and house connection are and sever the cable line causing you to miss the season finale of American Idol and forcing me...I mean the guy, to stay super late and wait for the repair guy to come splice the line before you have a panic attack.

Opp, wrong thread.

A couple 1" conduits turned up in 6x6 PVC junction boxes every 100-200 feet from road to house. Coax/fiber/data in one, post lamps/security lights, etc in another. Run 6" schedule 80 PVC or rigid metal under driveway, walk ways, patios. Also conduits from future generator location. One pipe for generator power and one pipe for generator controls, battery charger, etc and maybe one for Cat5/6 for generator sensors and future low voltage.

I would hope the transformer(green box) is near your home and not 750' away and the whole run has the voltage drop. Do yourself and future home owners a favor and put conduits anywhere you can. Sleeves under everything. If crawlspace even more conduits for alarm, data, cameras, landscape lighting, pool, hot tub,etc.

Green box will be about 75ft from the house.   300 amp service.   House will be built with a standby generator, cat 5, pvc will be pre laid under patio, sidewalk and driveway, pre wired for security system, landscape lighting.   Will run electrical wire from house to future pole barn with enough amp for 3 220 outlets, carport will have a 220 wired for future electric car, outlets in eves.   We will have fuse panel capable of handling pool/hot tub in the future.

We ran our power 1440 feet to our house, 2 foot wide trench, bare electric wires in one corner and phone lines in the other corner.

No other lines or conduit we will likley never have DSL, had very limited cell service when we moved in.

If you pay extra, they will put them in conduit.  I have the feeder from the pole buried in 3" conduit for 1000', to a pedestal transformer, which then runs underground for another 200' to my house.  Expect to pay a lot for that, or you get power poles.

If the trench is open, run another conduit, they won't let anything else run in that conduit.

at 750 ft this is a waste of RG-11, the cable company will want at least 75-500 (small mainline cable that should be used in drops longer than 300ft) or whatever they use (smallest thing time warner used 10 years ago for mainline or long drops was  75-625 in our area) that corresponds to 75-500. At 750 ft from the road they are probably going to want to run a mainline and put a tap unit in a pedestal near the house cause it's probably 1k ft or more from their nearest ped. Getting close to the limits for Ethernet too, pick up some 22 or 24 gauge 3 pair (or larger) direct bury phone line.

Op if the power company will let you have them half fill the trench (assuming it's a few feet deep where they bury their cabling) and follow it with some at least 3 inch and if possible 4 in sched 40 pipe before completing the backfill and adding the ditch tape, blue wet/dry pvc glue works great on this stuff. You also want sweeping 90s on either end if you plan on pulling the cabling from above ground. If your string breaks, or you forget it, you can always rig up a blowing cap using a pvc pipe cap and a male quick connect air fitting screwed into the cap, make a "parachute" out of a grocery bag and run a lightweight polystring (think we use to use jet line brand) through a hole in the cap, open the valve on your air compressor and the parachute inflates and pulls the string through the pipe to the other end, use that string to pull some mule tape or dandyline (stuff rated for several hundred lbs) then use that line to pull your cabling, don't forget to pull a second pull string through the pipe along with your cabling for future use. They also make "rats" for the express purpose of blowing through pipe and pulling strings, but everyone has a plastic bag laying around the house.

Thanks for the info...

Not an electrician or engineer but I do know that the current rating of a given size wire is less in conduit than direct burial or in free air, possibly due to cooling or lack of same. And it is definitely cheaper material and labor-wise to do direct burial vs conduit.

I have about the same length water line you have . I ran 1 inch line . I regret not running a 1.5 or 2 inch line . Volume is worth having

If the power company is doing the trench you might be able to do that, but I have my doubts they'll do it.  Much easier if you as the home builder has your contractor do the utilities trench and have all those conduits put in place as part of the work order.

Be sure to check if you can get fiber optic interwebs out there while they are digging, may save some cash/convince them to go out there.

Check on your local codes.  I need 12" between utilities, gas, electric and water.  They cannot go in the same excavation unless it is wide enough to preserve that distance.  I don't think you'll win any friends with the power company if you start putting other lines in their excavation.

I wouldn't worry about cable at all.  When you get cable or internet, they'll come out with a vibratory plow and set it in before you know they're there.  In my area, they would run cable between the blades of grass if they could.  They don't even bother to come out and mark their lines because they figure it's easier to replace it if something happens than to locate it.

I'm doing the same thing in the back right now, except I have gas to worry about, too.

I live 1,100 ft off the road. Power cost me a buck a foot, plus 350 for a pole. They gave my one I had to pay for one. Cable used power poles for .50 a ft. Telephone ran the wires for free. Also if I wanted gas it would have been .50 a ft. Sewer is a septic tank. I had a well installed as no water service here. But my well water is better than any water service. County told me what size tank to get, how may feet of field lines, and where to run them.....