Spectrum and Wireless

Freeing up more federal government spectrum – potentially the largest source of additional spectrum for wireless broadband – requires a combination of administrative/budgetary and market mechanisms, stated Thomas Lenard in testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation for the hearing, “Wireless Broadband and the Future of Spectrum Policy.” In addition, he noted, spectrum licensed for mobile satellite services (MMS) is the largest block of available spectrum in the short run.

The U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee is holding an oversight hearing this week to examine the Federal Communications Commission’s progress in planning its upcoming spectrum incentive auction. The Commission expects the auction to contribute 120 MHz of broadcast spectrum to the goal of an additional 300 MHz for mobile broadband by 2015 established by the FCC’s National Broadband Plan. While the incentive auction is important and deserves the attention it is receiving from the commission and Congress, attention should also be paid to another category of spectrum: the Mobile Satellite Service (MSS) spectrum. This is the most immediately available spectrum – indeed, the only significant block of spectrum that is already licensed but not deployed. Since considerable doubt exists concerning whether the incentive auction will yield anything close to the projected 120 MHz, the commission might get more “bang for the buck” by focusing greater attention on removing the remaining impediments to the deployment of the MSS spectrum.