Terrestrial Spectrum Use, Orbital Arc Access Could Face WRC-23 Satcom Contention
Satellite use of terrestrial spectrum for direct-to-device service "will be a big tension" at the 2023 World Radiocommunication Conference and a likely subject of a WRC-2027 agenda item, said EchoStar Senior Vice President-Regulatory Affairs Jennifer Manner Wednesday at a Venable panel on space regulation. Panelists said they were fully confident the FCC's reorganization to create a Space Bureau would happen, perhaps within months.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Export Compliance Daily combines U.S. export control news, foreign border import regulation and policy developments into a single daily information service that reliably informs its trade professional readers about important current issues affecting their operations.
Congress has traditionally given the FCC lots of latitude on reorganizations, Manner said, noting creation of the Enforcement Bureau. She said the biggest issue with reorganization is "making sure it's more than rearranging" existing resources. She said the reorg also could give the space industry more of an advocate in the Space Bureau, since there has been tension in the International Bureau about how much it can advocate for the industry, since it also handles international issues.
The Space Bureau could bring more attention to and elevation of space issues, but creating the Office of International Affairs might ultimately be more significant, said Kalpak Gude, domestic regulatory affairs head for Amazon's Kuiper. He said those international functions haven't gotten the kind of attention within the agency and the management from the chair that the reorganization will bring.
There should be a broader U.S. focus on space sustainability, Manner said. She said it's worrisome that there's not an international forum for getting a framework in place, and the ITU might not be the right forum to tackle that. She said the FCC might not be the right agency to lead such efforts domestically, since others might have more expertise. Regardless, the U.S. needs to lead globally on the issue, akin to an Artemis Accords for space sustainability, she said.
Manner said satellite-related WRC matters generally get the support needed from the U.S., depending on the agenda item. She said one constant concern is protecting satellite industry access to spectrum. She said WRC-2023 could also have developing nations raising concerns about orbital arc access. She said the massive investments in space and the growing demand for satcom services, such as for direct-to-device, is going to bolster industry calls that it needs increased access to spectrum.
All the panelists urged a whole-of-government space licensing approach. Manner said one thing the U.S. shouldn't lose is the efficiency it already has where a satellite operator can get construction, launch and operation authority together at the FCC. A challenge with the FCC being the expert agency in charge of space licensing is that it's not part of the executive branch, she said.
Ultimately, what the space industry wants is a licensing regime that doesn't involve relicensing by different agencies, but the work being centralized in one place and pulling in expertise from others, Gude said. Whether legislation is needed to make that happen isn't clear, he said.
The U.S. has different regulators of federal and nonfederal spectrum use, but in-space servicing, assembly and manufacturing missions will have both federal and nonfederal customers looking to use the same spectrum, said Audrey Allison, Aerospace's Center for Space Policy and Strategy senior project leader. There's no reason to have different regimes for the same kinds of operations, depending on customer type, she said.
The FCC/NTIA spectrum coordination relationship “Is a work in progress" and could be more transparent to industry, said Allison. Manner added that dialogue between the two has increased, which should help.