On 12 July 2006 Ofcom published a consultation on higher power limits for licence-exempt devices.
It raised three key questions:
- Should higher powers be allowed at 2.4GHz in rural areas?
- Should power levels be raised in all areas at 5.8GHz?
- Should conducted rather than radiated power levels be used as the basis for regulation?
We received 30 responses from a wide range of organisations. This note provides a brief summary of the responses across each of the key questions and sets out our proposals for further action.
Concerning the use of higher powers in rural areas, there was a variety of responses from stakeholders. Many stakeholders highlighted the issue of potential interference resulting from increasing powers which, they argued, would outweigh the potential benefits. This, they argued, would result in a net cost rather than benefit of introducing higher power levels. Further, DSL deployment has progressed substantially in rural areas since Ofcom started this work to the extent that 99.6% of all UK households can now get data rates of 512kbits/s or higher. Therefore, there is now much less need for these services to provide broadband in rural areas. After careful consideration of the evidence presented to us by stakeholders we have concluded not to progress with allowing higher powers at 2.4GHz in rural areas.
Concerning our proposal to adopt the higher power limit of four watts EIRP (in all geographical areas), from the draft ECC Recommendation (06) 04 in 5.8GHz, this had fair support and we are proposing to implement this by updating the relevant licence documentation for the band.
Concerning the change of licence specification from radiated to conducted power, there was a mixed reaction, but those that were supportive generally felt that we should make any such change through European bodies rather than in the UK alone. We will therefore investigate the possibility of this concept being explored at a European level.