Frequency spectrum is limited and invaluable for communications and other applications. For that reason, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) openly endorses spectrum sharing with industrial and other users. While the DoD may be the country’s biggest user of frequency spectrum, it must share spectrum to maintain a healthy economic environment in the country.
Speaking recently at the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s Spectrum Policy Symposium, the DoD’s chief information officer (CIO), John Sherman, said, “We absolutely get it at the DoD that we need to balance our economic advantage by maximizing spectrum, as well as being able to preserve our national security responsibilities.”
Regarding China, he mentioned their steady advances. “They’re challenging us in many spaces—not just with defense and military, but in economic, technology, spectrum, and otherwise. We all better be able to rise to the challenge of what they’re presenting; finding the spectrum way ahead is critical to our nation.”
Sherman noted that the DoD is working with partners, including the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), on sharing the portion of the spectrum from 3,100 to 3,450 MHz. This effort, known as Emerging Mid-Band Radar Spectrum Sharing (EMBRSS), is based on successful earlier spectrum-sharing activities.
Because the DoD is so highly dependent on this portion of frequency spectrum for radar, vacating those frequencies would not be economically feasible and requires an intelligent sharing of spectrum space with industry. So far, the DoD has held 10 meetings as part of the Partnering on Advanced and Holistic Spectrum Solution (PATHSS) to join the DoD with inter-agency partners, industry, and academic contributors to find practical ways to share frequency spectrum from 3,100 to 3,450 MHz.