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Intro (Rick)

Welcome to the National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center, Communications Technologies Center of Excellence webinar series.

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My name is Rick Mulvihill and I am the director of the center, who, along with Charlie Stephenson, our director of outreach and technology assistance, and Mr. Robert Rhoads from the Department of Homeland Security’s, Office of Emergency Communications will be presenting and or answering questions today.

Today’s webinar is the 6th in a series of webinars that will be presented by the NLECTC Communications Technologies Center of Excellence.

If you have a question during the presentation or at the end, please use the Q&A tab at the top of your screen and submit your question. We will attempt to answer your questions at the end of the presentation.

A handout of the presentation of terms is available on the site. If you look on the right side of the top tool bar you will see an icon that looks like a couple sheets of paper located two icons to the left of the word feedback. You can download copies there. A recording of this presentation as well as speaker notes will be available by this Friday on our JustNet site which is available at under the services tab. This address will be displayed at the end of the presentation.

The topic of today’s webinar will be the Federal Communications Commission narrow-banding mandate and what it means to public safety agencies operating on radio systems below 512 MHz.

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The National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center, Communications Technologies Center of Excellence is a project supported by an award from the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs’ National Institute of Justice.

The opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in the presentation are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the U.S. Department of Justice.

I now will turn our presentation over to Charlie Stephenson.

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Thanks Rick

Presentation of Webinar

Today’s webinar will focus on providing public safety practitioners information concerning the Federal Communications Commission’s narrow-banding mandate and what it means to public safety. The intent of this webinar is to inform criminal justice professionals who may be unfamiliar with the re-farming of frequencies below 512 MHz along with providing those individuals directly involved with the latest information.

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During the next thirty minutes we will provide an overview of the FCCs narrow-banding mandate. Beginning with a brief history behind the change and why the change is needed. We will then move on to who is affected touching on the technical aspects of narrow-banding including how radio coverage may be affected followed by the challenges of narrow-banding explaining the steps that agencies should follow to ensure a smooth transition. After that we will go over again the important dates to remember along with frequently asked questions and then finish up with what the future holds as far as further changes.

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So what is the history behind this need to move from wideband to narrow-band radio systems? The origins of public safety radio began with traditional analog radio systems therefore frequency allocations for public safety radios were based on the use of analog technologies. However as is the case with almost any technology our radio equipment and the science behind it has continued to make advances allowing us to more effectively use the limited frequency resources allocated for public safety use.

Efforts at improving spectral efficiency have focused on migrating to digital techniques as an effective way of improving spectral efficiency without increasing overall bandwidth or reducing the quality of public safety communications. Coincident with the advances in digital technologies is a corresponding decrease in the required spectrum bandwidth to maintain the same quality of service for a given voice channel. As a result, it is now possible to increase the spectral efficiency of public safety spectrum allocations. This is accomplished by reducing the single voice channel bandwidth from the traditional analog value of 25 kHz to a value 12.5 kHz. In this way, the availability of usable channels is effectively doubled in the same equivalent bandwidth. Narrow-banding, as the process has become to be known, will allow for improved spectrum efficiency in the VHF (150-170 MHz) and UHF (421-512 MHz) land mobile radio frequency bands.

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Of course the purpose of narrow-banding is to promote more efficient use of the VHF andUHF land mobile bands. Today, these bands are highlycongested, and there often is notenough spectrum available forlicensees to expand their existing systems or implementnew systems. As licensees convert to equipment that operates on narrowerchannel bandwidths, new channels will become available for licensing by parties

that need them. It also is hoped that the narrowband conversion willspur thedevelopment and use of new technologies that will further promote efficientspectrum use, be less susceptible to interference, and provide licensees withenhanced capabilities.

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Why must we change? The simplest answer is radio spectrum is a finite resource and the demand for new frequency licenses has far surpassed what is available without change!

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Who is affected? All users of existing part 90 radio systems operating on frequencies between 150-512 MHz must convert their systems either to 12.5 kHz bandwidth or to a technology that provides one voice path per 12.5 kHz of bandwidth or provides a data rate of 4800 bps/6.25 kHz. This includes not only public safety but the industrial and business licensees.

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How and who mandated the migration to narrow-banding?

Due to the ever increasing need by not only new but existing users for spectrum the FCC in the 1990s began making plans to utilize spectrum below 512 MHz more efficiently in the VHF and UHF bands. However it was not until 1995 that we first saw any real action by the FCC when theyadopted the first Refarming Report and Order (R&O) that was designed to facilitate the introduction of advanced technologies into the private wireless services. This first R&O provided that, in order to effect a transition from a wideband (25 kHz) channel plan to a narrowband (12.5 kHz) channel plan, the FCC would approve only increasingly spectrally efficient equipment. Specifically, after February 14, 1997, the FCC would approve new models of equipment for wideband operations only if they were also capable of operating on 12.5 kHz or narrower channels. Further, after January 1, 2005, the FCC proposed to approve equipment for 25 kHz or 12.5 kHz channels or both only if it was also capable of operating on 6.25 kHz or narrower channels. At that time, the FCC declined to implement a comprehensive set of dates mandating strict manufacturing and licensing requirements, or to require users to replace existing wideband systems.

In 2003, in the Second Report and Order on the same subject, the FCC concluded that its initial refarming rules had not resulted in the desired increase in efficiency in the VHF and UHF MHz bands and that further action was required. Consequently, the FCC again amended its rules providing a schedule for the migration of Private Wireless systems to narrowband technologies. The amendment stated no applications for new wideband 25 kHz systems or geographical expansion of existing wideband systems could be filed after January 13, 2004. Additionally the FCC established mandatory deadlines for migration to narrowband operation for UHF and VHF bands. The deadlines were January 1 2013 for non-public safety radio systems and January 1, 2018 for public safety systems.

The FCCs Second Report and Order resulted in eighteen petitions for reconsideration being filed by licensees and national public safety organizations, requesting an immediate stay of the 2004 deadline pending resolution of the petitions for reconsideration. At issue in these stay requests was the commission's decision to prohibit any applications for new operations using wideband channels and modifications to existing systems. The FCC subsequently stayed this portion of the order pending resolution of all petitions for reconsideration.

On December 23, 2004, the FCC released the third Memorandum Opinion and Order and Third Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and Order. It addressed the 18 petitions for reconsideration of the rules adopted in the Second Report and Order in this proceeding to promote migration to narrowband (12.5 kHz) technology in the Private Wireless services. In addition, the FCC stayed the January 1, 2005, date pending resolution of the issues raised in the Third Further Notice.

The major decisions contained in the third Memorandum Opinion and Order and Third Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and Order affecting public safety included moving up the date for mandatory migration to 12.5 kHz technology to coincide with the industrial business radio pool migration deadline of January 1, 2013 and revised the interim dates established in the second Report and Order allowing applications for new operations and modifications to existing systems using 25 kHz channels to be accepted until January 1, 2011

The third Memorandum Opinion and Order also allowed for the manufacture and importation of any VHF and UHF band equipment operating on a channel bandwidth up to 25 kHz to be permitted until January 1, 2011. After that date, manufacture and importation of any 150-174 MHz and 421-512 MHz band equipment operating on a channel bandwidth greater than 12.5 kHz would be accepted only to the extent that the equipment meets the narrowband spectrum efficiency standards.

As one last change the FCC also revised its Rules to exempt certainpaging-only frequencies from narrow-banding requirements. Thesepaging frequencies are generally licensed to commercial services and are widely used by public safety agencies, particularly by volunteer fire-rescue and EMS agencies.

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The next several slides illustrate the differences between wideband channelization and narrowband channelization as it relates to the FCCs narrow-banding mandate.

Beginning with slide 11, slide 11 illustrates private land mobile radio (LMR) systemsincluding municipal government and State and local public safety systems before narrow-banding used blocks of radio spectrum called channels. Historically, LMR systems have used 25 kHz-wide channels with 15 KHz channel spacing between centers. This channel spacing format meant that agencies were not able to use adjacent channels at close distances due to the overlap between frequencies.

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Slide 12 illustrates that currently in some areas due to agencies migrating quicker than others that careful coordination with wideband users must be made due to the overlap of bandwidth between wideband frequencies and narrowband frequencies within the VHF band plan.

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Slide 13 illustrates what the VHF band plan will look like after narrow-banding to 12.5 kHz is complete. Note that there still is an overlap in adjacent channels that will have to be taken into consideration when planning new systems or requesting new frequencies, however the migration to 12.5 kHz does substantially increase the number of useable channels.

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Slide 14 illustrates what the VHF band plan will look like if and when radio equipment becomes available and the FCC mandates VHF licensees migrate to a final channelization plan of 6.25 kHz.

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Moving on to UHF slide 15illustrates the UHF band plan before narrow-banding. Note unlike VHF there is no overlap in channel spacing allowing for adjacent wideband channels to be used by neighboring agencies.

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Slide 16 illustrates that currently in some areas due to agencies migrating quicker than others that careful coordination with wideband users must be made due to the overlap of bandwidth between wideband frequencies and narrowband frequencies within the UHF band plan.

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Slide 17 illustrates what the UHF band plan will look like after narrow-banding to 12.5 kHz is complete. Note that once all channels have been converted there will no longer be an overlap in adjacent channels, effectively giving users a 50% increase in the number of channels available for use.

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Slide 18 illustrates what the UHF band plan will look like if and when radio equipment becomes available and the FCC mandates UHF licensees migrate to a final channelization plan of 6.25 kHz.

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Next I would like to discuss radio coverage. As the deadline for narrow-banding approaches the subject of how coverage will be affected is being debated more and more. From an engineering or technical stand-point migrating from 25 kHz to 12.5 kHz must be looked at differently depending on if we are analyzing coverage of a digital or analog system. I will start by discussing analog coverage first.Migrating from a 25kHz channel width to a 12.5kHz width effectively reduces the deviation by half and increases the required single to noise ratio of your radio by 4 to 7dB another words narrow-banding caused a 6dB loss.

Slide 20However, it is not as simple as just computing a 6dB loss (6dB higher threshold) on a coverage model and seeing how it affects your agency’s coverage. Slide 21 For one a decrease or increase in signal to noise ratio cannot be plotted on a straight line in fact it must be plotted on a reverse curve meaning as percentage of area with at least minimum signal to noise increases the radio becomes less sensitive to small losses in the signal-to-noise ratio. For example if 90 percent of a service area is covered with an adequate signal-to-noise ratio the coverage loss due to narrow-banding would be 26 percent. However if 99 percent of the service area is adequately covered the coverage loss would only be 4 percent.

So what does all this talk of percentage actually mean to your agency? Well for some agency’s the reduction in coverage may not be an issue while for others it may require that additional repeater sites be added to restore the same level of coverage they had before moving to narrow-banding.

Next I will discuss the affects of migrating from a 25kHz bandwidth to a 12.5kHz bandwidth on a digital system. I will begin by discussing Project 25 digital systems in which there is good news. Unlike legacy analog equipment P25 equipment has been optimized for 12.5kHz operation. The fading channel service threshold for P 25 equipment is 3 to 4dB better than wideband FM radios. So affects on coverage of P25 systems should be minimal. For other than P25 equipment such as 2-slot TDMA equipment operating on 25 KHz wide channel, coverage losses can be determined by using computer propagation modeling that take into account digital terrain data. Two studies should be performed; one for a wideband channel threshold (e.g., -102 dBm) and a second for a narrowband channel with a 6 dB higher threshold. You can then compare the two models and see how the migration will affect your coverage. However keep in mind the use of computer propagation modeling is a hypothetical prediction of coverage based on mathematical analysis of terrain and RF properties and is subject to inaccuracies.

Slide 22What is the best course of action for agencies regardless of whether they operate on analog or digital, well it begins by having a good understanding of your radio systems current level of performance and ends with choosing the best course of action that will provide you with the level of coverage needed to meet your agency’s specific needs.

For some it may mean living with a system that has a small reduction in performance while for others it may mean adding addition repeaters to compensate for the loss in service area coverage.

I will now turn it over to Robert Rhoades who will cover the challenges agencies fact in complying with the narrow-banding mandate.

Dusty

Dusty (slides 23to 29).

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Thank you very much Charlie. I will spend a few moments with you discussing the challenges associated with the Narrow-band requirements. Specifically, I will talk about planning, funding, resources, coordination, and maintaining interoperable communications.

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The first step is of course to establish a plan. You need to look at your existing system and determine what is narrowband-capable and what equipment must be replaced. From that inventory you can identify the costs of equipment. But you will also need to include the costs of re-programming equipment.

Local officials will need to work together to identify a funding mechanism

You must involve your neighbors. Establish joint planning meetings with neighboring jurisdictions and agencies to coordinate your actions and establish a schedule to transition to narrowband operation and maintain interoperable communications during the transition

As part of the schedule and plan, develop procedures and identify the resources for the transition and review the procedures with all affected parties

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I will offer a few clarifications regarding the transition as they affect the planning component. Although P25 radios satisfy the narrow-banding requirement, it is not necessary to convert to digital in order to narrowband.