UPDATE NTIA Administrator Alan Davidson told lawmakers in his appearance before the House Communications and Technology Subcommittee this week that in light of a new DoD study, DoD can’t currently share the lower 3 GHz band with commercial users. The DoD report is not yet public, according to Broadband Breakfast.
Davidson said the report indicates the spectrum could be shared in certain circumstances in the future. “The answer is no right now. They’ve not seen a way forward on that. And we think their technical work in that area is strong,” he said.
The Infrastructure Law mandated the report, which NTIA received in September. Some of the report is classified, and NTIA wasn’t able to brief lawmakers on its contents before Tuesday’s hearing, Davidson said, according to Broadband Breakfast.
The administration’s National Spectrum Plan says NTIA will continue to study opening the band in the future. Davidson said two options are changes to make sharing possible, or moving a government system to another band. “There are no easy answers here,” he said. “But we felt the band was too important to give up.”
The National Spectrum Plan identified 2,786 MHz of spectrum across five bands for possible new uses, according to Davidson. He told lawmakers that NTIA will “issue an implementation plan” to apply the blueprint “by mid-March.”
By Leslie Stimson, Inside Towers Washington Bureau Chief
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