New QO-100 Band Plan Announced

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In time for the 1-year anniversary of the successful commissioning of the two transponders of Qatar-OSCAR 100, an encore is pending:

The capacity of the NB transponder will be expanded from about 250 KHz to almost 500 KHz.

In addition to extended areas for the various operating modes, more space is also being created in particular for "mixed mode" and other special operating cases. In addition to frequencies reserved for emergency radio operations, more experiments are to be made possible here.

But all this only with a maximum bandwidth of 2.7 kHz.

Automatic operation requires a special license from the local licensing authorities and must be coordinated with the operator beforehand; this task is performed by AMSAT-DL on behalf of QARS and Es'hailSat.

To take account of user behavior, AMSAT-DL has almost doubled the SSB range in particular.

Further details - https://amsat-dl.org/en/neuer-qo-100-bandplan/


New Draft ARRL HF Bandplans

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The HF Bandplanning committee has been looking at the HF digital mode segments and has issued a new draft bandplan

“Conflicts have surfaced about interference among digital segments of HF bandplans. The situation was referred to the HF Bandplanning Committee for consideration and recommendations to increase harmony.

The group considered a variety of positions on the issues, and developed the recommendations below. In general, the Committee agrees that the recent, extreme popularity of digital modes is likely to continue or accelerate. FT8 as a mode is the poster child for the rapid and extreme rise in popularity that is possible with the new digital modes. We expect more of this evolution in the future. Along with digital modes, there has been an increase in automatically controlled digital stations (ACDS). We believe this trend will continue as well.

In general, the committee is of the opinion that there is justification for additional space to become available for digital modes, as well as for the operation of digital stations under automatic control”
— ARRL Report Committee

Continued Access to 3GHz spectrum

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Continued Access to 3GHz spectrum

In its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) in WT Docket 19-348, the FCC proposed to relocate all non-federal operations, including amateur uses, to spectrum outside the 3.3 – 3.55 GHz band. The Commission anticipates auctioning this spectrum to expand commercial use of 5G cellular and wireless broadband services if agreement can be reached on the relocation of — or sharing with — the federal incumbents that operate in the same band. Publication of the NPRM in the Federal Register on 22nd January 2020 established deadlines of 21st February 2020 for comments and 23rd March 2020 for reply comments.

The FCC has requested comment on the uses radio amateurs make of the spectrum and appropriate relocation options. Complicating matters is the fact that radio amateurs must consider the possibility that the immediately adjacent 3.1 – 3.3 GHz band is included in the spectrum that Congress has identified for a similar study. FCC Commissioner Michael O’Reilly, in a December statement, referenced the fact that the lower band may also be considered for non-federal reallocation, potentially limiting relocation possibilities.

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