Got a message from the PSU meteo department's office from the FCC and UCAR, and figured since it was a public message, I'd share it with you. (I'm thinking for 80% of you, this is going to be way over your head, but for those who digest serious data from obs and all, this might be worth discussing):
The 1675-1710 MHz band is allocated on a co-primary basis for federal and non-federal use for the
Meteorological Aids Service and the Meteorological Satellite Service (Space-to-earth). Specifically, this
band is used for downlinks from certain weather satellites and radiosondes (weather balloons) that are
administered by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). NOAA provides
these services for weather forecasting, tracking of hurricanes and other storms, prediction of flooding and
drought conditions, and warning against other hazards to life and property.
We expect that this band is relatively lightly used, both geographically and temporally, and thus could be
shared by others. We seek comment on the utility of the 1675-1710 MHz band of spectrum for wireless
broadband services, and approaches to making the band available for such uses. It may be possible that
reception of the weather satellite downlink transmissions could occur at a relatively small number of sites
and be distributed via terrestrial services, such as over the Internet or other managed services. Thus, with
regard to incumbent satellite receive-only stations, we seek comment on the extent to which and manner
in which non-federal users directly access federally authorized Meteorological Satellite Service space
station downlink transmissions. We also seek comment on the extent to which non-federal users directly
1 Connecting America: The National Broadband Plan, Recommendation 5.8, p.86 (FCC, 2010). The
National Broadband Plan is available at http://www.broadband.gov/plan/.
2
access transmissions from radiosondes. Also, it may be feasible for radiosondes to operate using
substantially less bandwidth than they currently do, freeing spectrum for other uses, or for them to use an
alternative technology or relocate to other spectrum.
Although the 1675-1710 MHz band is co-allocated for non-federal use, the Commission's database shows
no active licensees in the spectrum. Non-federal entities such as universities, private sector weather
forecasters and others are thought to employ receive-only stations for reception of Meteorological
Satellite Service space station downlink transmissions, and in this case an FCC authorization for receiveonly
earth stations is not required. Therefore, the Commission has no information on the extent of such
non-federal use in the band.
So, essentially, FCC wants to use the spectrum (kind of like hard drive space in the radio waves) to put wireless communications, and move your weather data to perhaps small, finely tuned transmitters, who would then pipe it through the internet or some means like that.
For most of you, I would imagine this is a non-issue. But I know that many of you work for meteorological industries (WSI, TWC, AccuWeather) who probably love having the "raw feeds" from radiosondes, satellite imagery, and such. Also, if you are faculty in a meteo/atmsci department, this would probably affect the quality of the data ingested into the system This would be a big impact for you as noted.
Like I said, most of this is over your head. But if you know anything about this, do share.
If so you so desire, the original document is found here:
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DA-10-1035A1.pdf
