The FCC picked up more expressions of interest in participating in wireless emergency alert tests in combination with the agency over the past week, including by some larger players, with more than 40 filing as of Friday (see 2205060058). The City of Chicago Office of Emergency Management and Communications said it would like to participate in a test, in a brief filing in docket 22-160. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Emergency Management expressed an interest. “We serve over 1.1 million people within our jurisdictions of both the City of Charlotte as well as Mecklenburg County,” the agency said: “As part of a fixed nuclear facility program due to the location of the McGuire Nuclear Station in our county, we have an enhanced need for strong WEA capabilities to communicate with members of the public.” King County, Washington, noted its population is larger than that of 15 states. “Seattle will participate and use their volunteers to verify performance within the city; their emergency managers can also send WEA messages during the test,” King County said: “Other cities within the county will also be invited to assist. These known entities can be pre-trained in what to expect and can be relied upon to provide accurate data about their location and time when a message is received.” The Orange County Operational Area in California volunteered, noting it includes “a resident population of approximately 3.2 million, including densely packed urban areas through sparse rural canyon populations.” The FCC released a public notice last month seeking partnerships with local emergency agencies to gather data on how WEA is performing at the local level (see 2204210050). The FCC is seeking “testing partners that represent the diverse environments where WEAs are sent (i.e., dense urban, urban, suburban and rural areas).”

Mavenir spoke with an aide to Commissioner Brendan Carr on the FCC’s legal ability to address open radio access network deployment. “The Commission should further consider incumbent … manufacturer dominance on an individual network and geographical basis, consistent with customer purchasing decisions,” said a filing posted Friday in docket 21-63: “When it does so, Mavenir believes the facts will show that the Commission should require interoperability and the development of open interfaces for RAN equipment.” Mavenir included in the filing recent ORAN principles from the U.K.

Comments are due June 27, replies July 27, in docket 22–137 on the receiver performance notice of inquiry that FCC commissioners approved 4-0 last month (see 2204210049), said a Friday Federal Register notice. “The Commission seeks to build upon the progress, including technological advances, in recent years that has enabled better receiver interference immunity performance, and the Commission seeks comment on where those efforts and advances have been most successful,” said the notice.

FirstNet and AT&T took part in a recent exercise hosted by the California National Guard and California Office of Emergency Services Fire Rescue Branch to test response to an earthquake in Sonoma, AT&T said Thursday. “A key component of creating a unity across such varied groups is communications,” said Phil White, lead exercise planner: “By providing participants with FirstNet enabled devices, the agencies were able to experience the importance of seamless connections.”

The FCC, as expected, denied petitions for reconsideration filed by wireless-mic makers Sennheiser and Shure of a December 2020 order (see 2012080064) closing the agency’s 2015 NPRM on whether to allocate a vacant channel for use by white space devices and wireless microphones (see 2204060068). The companies faced an uphill fight, with strong opposition from NAB and a united commission voting to close the proceeding. “We uphold the conclusions and reasoning in the Termination Order,” said an FCC order listed in Thursday’s Daily Digest. While “we have concluded that we should not proceed with the proposals in this docket, the Commission is committed to supporting white space devices and wireless microphones and has pursued, and continues to pursue, avenues to ensure adequate spectrum availability for the important services they provide,” the order said. The record reflects “a large number of comments” and opposition by NAB, the FCC said: “Generally, the comments are similar statements expressing strong support for the important functions performed by wireless microphones and support for the designation of one UHF channel for wireless microphone use.” After reviewing comments, the FCC found adoption of rules proposed in a 2015 NPRM “would not strike the most reasonable balance that would best serve the public interest,” the order said: “We make this determination in light of other actions taken by the Commission since the 2015 NPRM that will support wireless microphone users and the burdens that the proposal would impose on broadcasters.”

Verizon laid out its top concerns as the FCC follows up on a network resilience NPRM commissioners approved 4-0 in September, amid hints regulation could follow (see 2109300069). “Adopt a general reasonableness standard for allowing roaming at the request of another provider,” Verizon said in a call with staff from the Public Safety Bureau: “Enumerate a non-exhaustive list of relevant factors for determining reasonableness in response to service provider complaints.” A fixed deadline for activating roaming “in response to a request is unworkable; every disaster event is unique, and affects different service providers differently,” said a filing posted Wednesday in docket 21-346.

Acconeer CEO Lars Lindell and others from the company discussed potential technical complications with FCC Office of Engineering and Technology staff as the agency considers revised rules for short-range radars in the 60 GHz band, the topic of a July NPRM (see 2107130066). “Technical rules based on channelization would not work for pulse radar, which does not have abrupt edges as short pulses are spread over a wide bandwidth to achieve the needed resolution,” Acconeer said. “If the Commission adopts rules for radar different from what has been proposed in the NPRM, it may be necessary to set out certain technical requirements for radar systems that transmit in durations measured in nanoseconds and different requirements for systems that transmit in durations measured in milliseconds,” said a filing posted Wednesday in docket 21-48: “A unified framework could be based on these two different scales.”

FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel backed making more spectrum available for 5G but didn’t discuss any additional target bands during remarks to a CTIA conference that were posted in Wednesday’s Daily Digest. “We need to replenish the spectrum pipeline for new commercial innovation if we want to continue to lead the world in Wireless,” Rosenworcel said: “We also need to be creative. I think that creativity is in our national DNA. Let’s speculate that’s what Marconi saw here, too. Because remember that spectrum auctions, incentive auctions, unlicensed authorization, and dynamic spectrum access systems all got their start in the United States. We’ve turned spectrum scarcity into abundance before. We can do it again.” Rosenworcel also noted the importance of open radio access networks: “Open and interoperable equipment is the future, and we are working to ensure that Open RAN technology is being built here and now.”

T-Mobile asked the FCC to allow it to use stage 2 mobile support through a program providing emergency relief to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands to pay for the deployment of distributed antenna systems, but without the requirements sought by the Telecommunications Bureau of Puerto Rico (see 2205020057). “Adding additional requirements as suggested by the Bureau at this late stage could unnecessarily delay deployment,” said a filing posted Tuesday in docket 18-143: “Time is of the essence as T-Mobile enters its final year of Stage 2 funding, and adding more oversight likely would delay and ultimately might prevent T-Mobile from timely completing deployments before Stage 2 funding ends.” The rules for the fund don’t contemplate bureau review, and there's no basis to add new burdensome obligations in response to a petition for declaratory ruling clarifying the scope of the rules, T-Mobile said.

National Institute of Standards and Technology researchers determined performance is consistent across various millimeter-wave bands that have been targeted for 5G. Researchers used a new method to measure frequency effects across 26.5-40 GHz. “After extensive study in the laboratory and two real-world environments, NIST results confirmed that the main signal path -- over a clear ‘line of sight’ between transmitter and receiver -- does not vary by frequency, a generally accepted thesis for traditional wireless systems but until now not proven for the mmWave spectrum,” said the agency Tuesday. Researchers found signal losses in secondary paths “where transmissions are reflected, bent or diffused into clusters of reflections … can vary somewhat by frequency, depending on the type of path,” NIST said: “Reflective paths, which are the second strongest and critical for maintaining connectivity, lost only a little signal strength at higher frequencies.”