3/25 FCC Comments on Public Interest Need for Rules Facilitating Sharing of Satellite Spectrum

The Open Technology Institute at New America wrote and filed comments in concert with public interest allies Public Knowledge, the Center for Rural Strategies, Next Century Cities, the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, Oregon Fiber Partnership (dba Link Oregon), and Access Humboldt (hereinafter the “Public Interest Organizations” or “PIOs”) urging the Federal Communications Commission (Commission) to adopt rules to allow for expanded sharing of satellite spectrum. An introduction and summary is available below:

New America’s Open Technology Institute, Public Knowledge, the Center for Rural Strategies, Next Century Cities, the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, Oregon Fiber Partnership (dba Link Oregon), and Access Humboldt (hereinafter the “Public Interest Organizations” or “PIOs”) respectfully submit these comments in response to the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“NPRM”) seeking comment on rules governing burgeoning uses of nongeostationary satellite orbit, fixed-satellite service (NGSO FSS) systems. The PIOs urge the Commission to adopt and enforce a good faith coordination framework that facilitates intensive spectrum sharing, market entry and competition among NGSO operators. If the Commission prioritizes earlier-licensed systems, it should require the information necessary to coordinate and in any case adopt the degradation of service metric to determine harmful interference.

First, the PIOs strongly support the Commission’s adoption of a rule that maintains and enforces a good faith coordination requirement among all NGSO FSS operators regardless of processing round, including information-sharing requirements that enable and encourage more intensive and efficient spectrum sharing. Any prioritization based on processing round should be the default only when good faith coordination fails and not as a presumption or general rule.

Unfortunately, the Commission’s proposal to default to an all-or-nothing approach that prioritizes the operator approved in an earlier processing round creates a strong incentive for that party not to coordinate in good faith with a competitor approved in a later round. This harms consumers and wastes spectrum. Accordingly, the Commission should also make every effort to facilitate good faith coordination by ensuring that beam pointing and other necessary technical information is available, while also protecting proprietary or competitively-sensitive information from undue disclosure or misuse.

Second, The Commission should adopt a degraded throughput metric to determine the interference threshold that would adequately protect NGSO FSS systems from harmful interference. The PIOs believe that limitations on spectrum sharing and use should be based on the actual degradation of service that a system could reasonably expect to experience, and not on an arbitrary or overly-conservative I/N limit. As the Commission has clarified in recent proceedings, operators authorized to share a band with a priority licensee should be required to mitigate interference only to the extent that it results in actual and significant harmful interference to the service.

Finally, to boost competition, the PIOs also recommend the Commission adopt a sunset that does not significantly exceed that of the buildout period. The Commission suggests six years, which the PIOs agree is reasonable suggestion. Implementing a sunset of an appropriate length would help with combating spectrum hoarding and promote innovation and competition.

The recommendations in these comments would boost digital equity encouraging market entry and competition that could lower prices, and improve access in unserved and underserved rural, Tribal, and other less densely-populated areas in particular. This proceeding should be viewed as part of larger effort to modernize and encourage spectrum sharing, including through a use-it-or-share-it approach in 12 GHz and in other underutilized bands, with a goal of promoting widespread and equitable use of public airwaves. As the co-chairs of the Congressional Spectrum Caucus, Reps. Doris Matsui (D-CA) and Brett Guthrie (R-KY) recently wrote in a letter to Chairwoman Rosenworcel: “In addition to new coordination requirements, structural reforms to spectrum access rights and efforts to increase spectral efficiency, coupled with process reforms could support a more dynamic satellite environment.”