Broadcasters, Wireless Carriers, Satellite Companies Face Off Over WRC Recommendations
Broadcasters and satellite carriers clashed with wireless carriers and Dish Network on what positions the U.S. should take on spectrum use at the World Radiocommunication Conference in 2019, in comments posted Thursday and Friday in FCC docket 16-185. Broadcasters want to have language removed from ITU table of frequency allocations they said would leave spectrum dedicated to broadcasters open for wireless use, and most satellite carriers are seeking power constraints on terrestrial international mobile telecom (IMT) and protection for satellite incumbents. Carriers such as AT&T and T-Mobile don’t want changes to the language on the use of the broadcast spectrum, do want 37.0-43.5 GHz identified for IMT, and with Dish oppose power limits. To “most effectively promote" 5G, the FCC should adopt recommendations “that promote flexible spectrum use,” T-Mobile said.
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The language in the international table should reflect the allocations in the U.S. table, said every broadcast commenter, including NAB, Sinclair, low-power TV broadcaster HC2 and the major broadcast networks. The current language is like "barnacles attached to broadcast spectrum," the Pearl TV consortium said. The U.S. continuing to be associated with the footnotes allowing potential wireless use of the 470-608 MHz range internationally “only serves to create uncertainty regarding the future of the television industry,” NAB said.
Eliminating the U.S. from the footnotes would eliminate flexibility in spectrum use, said AT&T, T-Mobile, CTIA and Ericsson. “Deleting the United States from these footnotes would unnecessarily thwart the global harmonization of the 600 MHz spectrum recently repurposed in the incentive auction,” said AT&T. Since the U.S. decided to drop plans to use the bands in question for mobile uses after the incentive auction, “the continued inclusion of the United States in both footnotes is both outdated and inconsistent with fact,” HC2 said. Broadcasters view the language “as a threat that the mobile industry could leverage to grab more of our spectrum,” said NAB Spectrum Policy Vice President Robert Weller on a Friday meeting of the National Public Safety Telecommunications Council.
Identifying the 37-43.5 GHz tuning range for IMT internationally would “harmonize spectrum globally for IMT while preserving nations’ autonomy,” said CTIA. “Each administration will be able to accommodate its national priorities while simultaneously benefiting from the economies of scale that flexible tuning ranges will enable for 5G equipment,” Ericsson said. Satellite services “require technical protections and harmonized spectrum on a regional basis,” said satellite companies. They included Inmarsat, Intelsat, Echostar and Hughes Network. “Satellite signals do not stop at borders and it is simply not technically feasible to design satellites, serving ubiquitously-deployed terminals, to comply with frequency allocations and interference environments defined on a country-by-country basis,” they said.
Proposals for power constraints on terrestrial IMT are “restrictions based on a worst-case analysis that ignore the impact of realistic system characteristics,” Dish and Echostar wrote. Dish and Echostar “expect that their respective satellite networks, and in DISH’s case its terrestrial network too, will leverage 5G technologies,” the filing said. “Significant interference” can be caused to satellites in the 1980-2010 MHz band from IMT terrestrial base stations, Inmarsat said: The power constraints are a “straight forward method to allow IMT to operate in the band while at the same time avoiding this real and likely interference scenario.” Proposals for “co-existence measures and constraints” would have “a preclusive impact on our existing 3G and 4G deployments in the Personal Communications Service,” said Sprint.