FCC acting commissioner proposes dedicated spectrum for private space launches

FCC acting commissh Jessica Rosenworcel has proposed giving the US commercial space industry a dedicated block of spectrum in order to support future rocket launches. The measure would allow a secondary allocation to the 2200-2290-MHZ band to be used by private space travel and satellite companies during the pre-launch testing …

[Bitsminer]

It's a bit more complicated

The use of some S-band frequencies for TT&C (known as Telecommand/Telemetry or TC/TM elsewhere) is pretty common -- the need to apply for special permission is not, so this is a good idea by FCC^h^h^hElon to improve operations.

But satellites can use a lot of frequencies for a lot of purposes. TC/TM is commonly only 64 kbps down/12kbps up, since the standards are old and, actually, telemetry doesn't need much. (Not including TV feeds of course).

Every other use: radar, wideband downlinks, comms links, etc etc are in the 50 to 1200 Mbps range, and hence operators usually go to X-band (10GHz) and up. Because reasons, such as usable width of bands and ITU regulations. So asking Ofcom, FCC, or others what they think is really asking what they think they can negotiate at the next ITU meetup.

[Grey_Kiwi]

STAs are also a useful way for the enthusiast community to gain advance notice of who intends to launch from where and when, for example see https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=45440.320#msg2205686.

So there will be some transparency losses to go with the administrative gains

[Jonjonz]

More corporate welfare, the give-aways are just snowballing now in late stage capitalism.

[Yet Another Anonymous coward]

Not sure whether government seizing the rights to these frequencies in the first place is fascism or communism ?