Allocation of Spectrum in the 37.5 - 38.5 GHz, 40.5 - 41.5 GHz and 48.2 - 50.2 GHz Frequency Bands
The World Radiocommunications Conferences of 2000 and 2003 agreed to assign the 37.5-42.5 GHz band (V-band) to both the fixed service (FS) and the fixed satellite service (FSS) on a co-primary basis. At 37.5-40 GHz, FS is to be favored by technical rules. At 40-42.5 GHz, FSS is to be favored by technical rules. This is called “soft segmentation” of the band. In this proceeding, the Commission has implemented most of the changes necessary to achieve these allocations and soft segmentation.
A Third Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (Third NPRM), adopted in 2010, proposes to finalize four issues left undecided in prior phases of the proceeding: (1) allocation clean-up; (2) protection of Radioastronomy; (3) coordination between FSS gateway earth stations and FS stations in these bands; and (4) in order to allow satellites to increase their signal robustness to compensate for rain, consistent with the soft segmentation concept, this Third NPRM proposes mandating a mix of power increases and non-power methods, based on the rain rate in given geographical areas.
Third Notice of Proposed Rulemaking
