Tag Archives: WRC-19

Nov 22 2019

WRC-19 Update: Small Satellites, the 1240-1300 MHz band and Final Report

WRC19 - PB2T, VE3QN, EI3IO, DK4VW, K1ZZ, VK1DSH and RSGB Spectrum Forum Chair Murray G6JYB image credit DK4VW

WRC19 – PB2T, VE3QN, EI3IO, DK4VW, K1ZZ, VK1DSH and RSGB Spectrum Forum Chair Murray G6JYB image credit DK4VW

In the final week the meetings at WRC-19 have been running until 3am in the morning in an attempt to get the work completed.

The RSGB have released their WRC-19 report covering small satellites and also the Amateur 1240-1300 MHz band.

The report notes “A lesson from the process indicates how difficult it may be in future to achieve any upgrade to other amateur allocations.”

Read the RSGB Small Satellites and 23cm report at
https://rsgb.org/main/blog/news/gb2rs/2019/11/20/wrc-19-day-18-satellites-and-23cm/

Friday, November 22 saw WRC-19 conclude its month long biggest ever conference. Many of the 3,300 delegates had started to travel home even before the release of the ‘Provisional Final Acts’ and closing ceremony.

The ITU website has released the provisional acts as a huge 567-page PDF document—a tribute to the the hardworking editorial and translation teams at the conference. These provisional acts are due to come into force on January 1, 2021, so no early changes are currently expected in practice.

Read the RSGB WRC-19 Final report at
https://rsgb.org/main/blog/news/gb2rs/2019/11/22/wrc-19-day-20-and-finally/

WRC-19 Provisional Final Acts – 567 page document
https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-R/conferences/wrc/2019/Documents/PFA-WRC19-E.pdf

Nov 18 2019

IARU: WRC-19 Grinds On – Week 3

ITU WRC-19 LogoThe IARU has issued its report on Week 3 of the 2019 World Radiocommunication Conference being held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt from October 28 to November 22, 2019.

With just 3-1/2 days left for substantive work – the final session of the Plenary to approve texts to be included in the Final Acts is scheduled to end at noon Thursday, November 21 – delegates at WRC-19 face a daunting workload as the conferees try to reach consensus on several remaining issues including the agenda for the next WRC.

Future agenda items: As of now, no choices have been made as to which of more than three dozen proposed topics will be placed on the WRC-23 agenda. Each of the proposed agenda items would require studies to be conducted in the 2020-2023 timeframe, but ITU resources will not accommodate more than about half. Some face strong opposition and others remain ill-defined even at this late stage of the conference. The responsible committee is scheduled to complete its work in just one more day. It will be a long day.

Short Duration Satellites: There is still no agreement on how to protect existing services and uses of the uplink frequency band proposed for telemetry, tracking and command of these “simple” satellites.

5725-5850 MHz: This part of the amateur secondary allocation, which includes an amateur-satellite downlink at 5830-5850 MHz, is the subject of an unresolved conflict over parameters for wireless access systems including radio local area networks.

Frequencies above 275 GHz: This upper frequency range is not allocated but several bands are identified for passive (receive-only) use and administrations are encouraged to protect them from harmful interference. With that in mind, WRC-19 has identified other bands above 275 GHz for the implementation of land mobile and fixed service applications. The use of these bands for applications in other services, including amateur experimentation, is not precluded.

50 MHz in Region 1: The compromise agreement reported last week (see the IARU news release dated 10 November) survived review at the Working Group and Committee levels and awaits approval in Plenary.

With the 50 MHz issue essentially settled the IARU team is devoting most of its energy to explaining why the proposed agenda item for 1240-1300 MHz described in last week’s release is unnecessary and undesirable.

While IARU President Tim Ellam, VE6SH/G4HUA, left the conference at the end of the second week he is still a visible presence as a six-minute video interview is replayed on monitors scattered around the halls of the conference center. See it for yourself at

Source: IARU Press Release available on the new ARRL-IARU email group. You can join at https://groups.arrl.org/g/ARRL-IARU/

Nov 10 2019

WRC-19 Day 9 and 10: Satellites, 50 MHz and 1240-1300 MHz

RSGB Spectrum Forum Chair Murray G6JYB talking to delegates at WRC-19

RSGB Spectrum Forum Chair Murray G6JYB talking to delegates at WRC-19

The RSGB have released a report on days 9 and 10 of the 2019 World Radiocommunication Conference being held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt from October 28 to November 22, 2019.

The report covers Satellites, HF (7 MHz), a proposed 50 MHz band for the Amateur Service only (not Satellites) and Future Agenda Items including the 1240-1300 MHz band where a number of countries wish to restrict (or remove) amateur radio operation to “protect” GNSS servces. Both the European Galileo (due for completion 2020) and Japan’s Quasi-Zenith (QZSS) (due for completion 2023) GNSS systems have downlinks that transmit across 1260-1300 MHz.

Read the RSGB report at https://rsgb.org/main/blog/news/gb2rs/2019/11/10/wrc-19-day-10-halfway-there/

Read the RSGB WRC-19 updates at https://rsgb.org/main/blog/category/news/special-focus/wrc-19/

IARU Region 1 WRC-19 Week 2 report https://www.iaru-r1.org/index.php/174-news/latest-news/1914-wrc-19-week-2

IARU WRC-19 News http://www.iaru.org/news–events

CEPT ECC Report covers the key Agenda Item 1.1 on a 50 MHz Amateur Service band in ITU Region 1 – but not for the Amateur-Satellite Service
https://www.cept.org/ecc/groups/ecc/cpg/client/introduction/weekly-report-from-wrc-19

Nov 5 2019

RSGB WRC-19 Update: 23cms and A Long Day

IARU Team at WRC-19

IARU Team at WRC-19

The RSGB have posted an update on activities at the 2019 World Radiocommunication Conference during Tuesday, November 5.

A somewhat difficult start to the day’s proceedings began with another AI-10 Proposal being introduced for WRC-23 – protecting RNSS (Galileo etc) from secondary amateur usage in the 23cm band.

Future mobile/IMT was also being discussed in the 3-18 GHz range (including our 10 GHz band). Another item may even affect 241 – 700GHz. It will be a while before the WRC-23 agenda down-selection gets agreed at the conference. A busy day then continued as a raft of topics was attended, with few signs of positive progress.

Read the RSGB Day 7 report at
https://rsgb.org/main/blog/news/gb2rs/2019/11/05/wrc-19-day-7-23cms-and-a-long-day/

Other RSGB WRC-19 updates at
https://rsgb.org/main/blog/category/news/special-focus/wrc-19/

Nov 1 2019

Early Progress, Contention on Difficult Issues Mark First Week of WRC

ITU WRC-19 posterSharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, November 1, 2019 – Week 1 of the 2019 World Radiocommunication Conference saw agreement reached on several issues on which discussions prior to the conference had revealed consensus. Those were the easy ones; the rest will be more difficult.

The early decisions here in Sharm El-Sheikh were only possible because of countless hours of work conducted within the ITU Radiocommunication Sector and the six regional telecommunications organizations (RTOs) since the previous WRC in 2015. Three of these decisions were on issues of interest to the IARU.

IARU Team at WRC-19

IARU Team at WRC-19

The band 47.0-47.2 GHz was allocated solely to the amateur and amateur-satellite services by the 1979 World Administrative Radio Conference. Commercial wireless broadband interests had expressed some interest in the band being designated for International Mobile Telecommunications (IMT) and there was some concern that such a proposal might be made at WRC-19. The fact that none was forthcoming was due in part to the work of the IARU at the Conference Preparatory Meeting earlier this year and in the RTOs. The WRC has agreed to “no change” (NOC) at 47.0-47.2 GHz.

Another NOC decision that avoided impact on the amateur service applies to the band 5850-5925 MHz, which is an amateur secondary allocation in Region 2. Consideration of proposals involving other parts of spectrum in the 5-GHz range will take much longer.

Finally, the WRC has agreed to make no frequency allocations or other changes to the Radio Regulations to accommodate Wireless Power Transmission for electric vehicles (WPT-EV). Much more work remains to be done on an urgent basis in the ITU and other standards organizations if radiocommunication services are to be adequately protected from harmful interference that may be generated by WPT-EV, both at the fundamental frequency and from unwanted emissions.

ITU WRC-19 LogoConsideration of a 50 MHz allocation in Region 1 to harmonize the allocations in the three Regions was the subject of spirited debate in a Sub Working Group chaired by Dale Hughes, VK1DSH, of the Australian delegation. The four RTOs in Region 1 made disparate proposals to the conference and a small group of administrations proposed NOC. For three days there was no progress toward a consensus solution but that changed on Friday morning. An agreement has been reached, subject to confirmation by the regional groups, that will provide administrations in Region 1 with flexibility in how to accommodate their amateurs.

One of the most difficult issues facing WRC-19 is to develop an agenda for WRC-23. There are dozens of proposals for agenda items and they cannot all be accommodated within available ITU resources. The substantive work of considering these proposals began on Friday afternoon and must be completed over the next two weeks.

Some meetings on the more difficult issues are scheduled for Saturday, November 2. Delegates have been warned to expect more intensive use of weekend and evening hours as the conference proceeds toward its conclusion on November 22.

Source IARU http://iaru.org/

CEPT ECC report on WRC-19 Week 1
https://www.cept.org/ecc/groups/ecc/cpg/client/introduction/weekly-report-from-wrc-19

For daily updates see the RSGB WRC-19 Blog
https://rsgb.org/main/blog/category/news/special-focus/wrc-19/

Aug 30 2019

CEPT CPG decides position on 144, 50 and 1240-1300 MHz

CEPT Logo“At the insistence of the European Commission, a WRC-23 agenda item was considered necessary to address the world-wide protection of Regional Navigational Satellite Systems from amateur emissions in the band 1240-1300 MHz.”

The CEPT ECC CPG met in Ankara during August 26-30 to finalise their position ahead of the ITU World Radiocommunication Conference 2019 (WRC-19) to be held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, October 28 to November 22. This conference will define the Agenda Items for WRC-23.

RSGB volunteers along with other radio amateurs in IARU Region 1 countries put in a considerable amount of work to defend the amateur radio allocations. Their hard work ensured the removal of 144-146 MHz from a study of additional spectrum for aeronautical applications and an agreement on a European Common Proposal for 50-52 MHz.

IARU Region 1 have released this report on the meeting:

The CEPT Conference Preparatory Group met this week in Ankara, Turkey. Items of interest to the amateur service which were finalised were:

– Agreement to a European Common Proposal (ECP) on allocating 50-52 MHz to the amateur service in Region 1 on a secondary basis with a footnote listing those countries where the amateur service will have a primary allocation in the band 50-50.5 MHz (WRC Agenda Item 1.1)

– Agreement to an ECP on spectrum to be considered for International Mobile Telecommunications, which does not now include the primary amateur band at 47-47.2 GHz (WRC Agenda Item 1.13)

– Agreement to an ECP that retains the current regulatory position in the 5725-5850 MHz frequency band which includes secondary allocations to the amateur service and the amateur-satellite service (WRC Agenda Item 1.16)

– Removal of 144-146 MHz from a French proposal for study of additional spectrum for aeronautical applications. (WRC Agenda Item 10)

– At the insistence of the European Commission, a WRC-23 agenda item was considered necessary to address the world-wide protection of Regional Navigational Satellite Systems from amateur emissions in the band 1240-1300 MHz. A draft WRC Resolution was agreed which underlines the importance of this frequency band to the amateur service and explicitly excludes the removal of existing allocations as part of the proposed agenda item. (WRC Agenda Item 10)

– There was no change to the already agreed CEPT position on Wireless Power Transmission (WRC Agenda item 9.1.6). This states that no change is needed in the Radio Regulations to address the question of operating frequency for WPT-EV, but leaves open the question of spurious emissions from WPT-EV.

Commenting on the outcome of CPG, IARU Region 1 President Don Beattie, G3BJ, said that the IARU team at Ankara (the only representatives of the amateur service at the meeting) had presented clear and convincing arguments for the amateur service position and he was pleased that regulators had recognised the strength of the amateur case. He expressed his thanks to everyone who had contributed to the outcome at CPG.

The issues now move to WRC in Egypt in November for final resolution. IARU will be there.

IARU Region 1 https://iaru-r1.org/

Note: Although the CEPT position includes a Primary allocation at 50.0 to 50.5 MHz it is for the Amateur Service only – the Amateur Satellite Service is excluded.

CEPT ECC CPG19-9 Ankara Meeting Minutes and Annexes are available for download at
https://cept.org/ecc/groups/ecc/cpg/client/meeting-documents/?flid=10064

Background to 1240-1300 MHz https://amsat-uk.org/2019/08/19/threat-to-amateur-radio-23cm-band/