WASHINGTON: The Department of Defense has completed a private 5G cellular network at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, where it will start experimenting on how to share the “highly scarce resource” that is the 5G spectrum with commercial industry.
The completion of the 5G network, announced Thursday, will allow the department to “evaluate the technical feasibility, methodologies, and utility of spectrum sharing and coexistence,” with commercial industry in mid-band spectrum, or 3 to 4 GHz, according to a Pentagon release.
Mid-band spectrum has valuable uses to both the military and commercial 5G, but in places with civilian demand, the DoD is wary of interference with some of its high-powered radars and weapons systems. In August last year, the Pentagon handed over 100mHz of mid-band spectrum to commercial 5G.
“These experiments illuminate the technology front on a very challenging spectrum sharing problem — how to share the limited spectrum between highly sensitive DoD assets and commercial networks,” Sumit Roy, director of Beyond 5G Thrust, said in the release. “In particular, airborne system dynamics coupled with potential information asymmetries. Solutions to such DoD inspired scenarios, that lie significantly beyond current 5G commercial network deployments operating on exclusively licensed spectrum, promise to usher in the long-awaited era of automated, dynamic sharing.”
At Hill AFB, the Pentagon will initially experiment with dynamic spectrum sharing in the 3.3-3.45 GHz band with airborne radar systems and 5G technologies. There is a planned upgrade in May 2022 to broaden the experiment to 3.1-3.45 GHz.
Some 12 vendors are involved in the project in Utah, working under three lines of effort: 5G Testbed, 5G Applications, and 5G Network Enhancements. The Pentagon said the projects will run for 39 months “to develop spectrum co-existence system solutions between Hill AFB’s private 5G network and airborne radars operating in the band,” including the Airborne Warning and Control System. It will also experiment with other DoD spectrum dependent systems, including C-130 Station Keeping Equipment.
A Pentagon announcement last year noted Nokia, General Dynamics Mission Systems, Booz Allen Hamilton, Key Bridge Wireless, Shared Spectrum Company and Ericsson as vendors for the spectrum sharing project.
The Hill Air Force Base project is part of $600 million award for 5G projects at five installations across the United States that the department made last year. According to the new release, the Hill project will cost $173 million.
“Electromagnetic spectrum is a highly scarce resource relative to demand and U.S. commercial operators lag in access to highly desired mid-band, or 3-4 GHz,” said Deb Stanislawski, director of 5G tranche prototyping and experimentation. “We must figure out how to share this band if we are to unleash a new wave of network innovation and break the global dependency on compromised 5G networks sold by state-subsidized, antagonistic peer competitors. These experiments are designed to rally both the Department and our industrial base to win at 5G and beyond.”
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