Northrop Grumman wants more
On April 21, 2003, Northrop Grumman Information Technology (NGIT) petitioned the FCC for a fast track rulemaking to allocate more broadband spectrum for public safety services. NGIT is seeking another 10 MHz of spectrum to be set aside in the 700 MHz band, preferably in the ranges of 747-752 and 777-782 MHz for national use by first responders.
According to the petition, the additional spectrum will further provide for the needs of both homeland security and emergency response entities in a post-9/11 world, permit federal, state and local governments to deploy advanced broadband wireless data applications and meet critical interoperability requirements.
NGIT cites an “overwhelming need” for additional public safety spectrum to create a nationwide Internet protocol-based interoperable communications network that would have broadband capabilities. While the FCC allocated 24 MHz of spectrum for public safety use in 1997, the spectrum already has been set aside for other uses and channelization of the spectrum doesn’t make it possible to implement advanced wireless broadband technologies.
Royce Kincaid, NGIT’s program manager for Wireless Networks/Homeland Security, said that a national IP-based 700 MHz network will be, “Open architecture and open standards, so multiple manufacturers can make the same products that talk to each other… and a roadmap for the next 10 to 15 years.”
The network would be built on three principles, according to Kincaid: “Interoperable, secure, broadband.”
From many perspectives, it is an attractive proposition. Any examination of existing public safety communications infrastructure reveals a morass of incompatible voice and data systems run by local, state, and federal government agencies. While preliminary efforts are underway to introduce interoperability between systems, there are many challenges to weaving together data systems, even for well-supported projects such as the Washington DC Metro area’s CapWIN project (“CapWIN connects crossed wires,” March 2003 MRT).
While there are emerging standards and technology for passing text messages between different systems using e-mail gateways, voice traffic is a much more complex challenge and high-bandwidth video transmission is the Mt. Everest everyone would like to climb. And few municipalities can afford to build and operate a technical and political complex entity such as CapWIN. An IP-based network would, by design, provide a proven interoperable infrastructure free from legacy hardware and spectrum usage.
Providing a secure network isn’t a difficult challenge and the underlying methods for transmission being proposed by NGIT and hardware partner Flarion Technology will provide enhanced protection.
“The 802.11 air interface isn’t secure, but it is encryptable with different levels of security,” said Royce, saying that users will likely opt for AES or DES encryption.
Flarion’s flash-OFDM technology uses both spread-spectrum and frequency-hopping techniques that are “hard to hack…”
Royce added, “We have guys doing [RF security analysis] for a living, and they say they’ll have a hard time cracking the technology.”
Broadband and expanding capacity is the most attractive selling point. Existing voice systems designed to interoperate with prior coordination between public safety agencies have been strained in recent large-scale incidents.
An after action report examining joint rescue efforts at the Pentagon on Sept. 11 between federal government responders and local government, Arlington County, Virginia, describes a situation where “almost all aspects… of communications were problematic from initial notification to tactical operations.”
Radio channels were initially “over saturated” and interoperability problems hindered emergency response efforts on scene.
Currently fielded data systems using existing technology currently operate at data rates of up to 19.2 Kbps, while even so-called 3G solutions being deployed by cellular carriers such as Sprint and Verizon operate at typical rates of 40-60 Kbps with “optimum” speeds of 144 Kbps. Even assuming optimum conditions in an emergency, 144 Kbps data rates will not support high-quality video transmission where speeds of between 1-1.5 Mbps are necessary to deliver valuable imagery.
By using additional contiguous spectrum in an IP-based infrastructure, NGIT and hardware partner Flarion Technologies paint a picture where a large number of simultaneous voice and data users can be supported along with enough free bandwidth for real-time quality video transmission.
Peter Carson, Flarion Technology’s vice president of marketing describes their flash-OFDM technology as the “Only IP friendly wireless technology available.”
Use of contiguous spectrum blocks in the 700 MHz band in combination with appropriate equipment placement would enable a wireless broadband network capable of supporting up to 400 simultaneous voice users, plus data users and video transmission with data rates of up to 10 Mbps.
According to Carson, equipment deployment density would depend on the coverage necessary.
For a typical highly-dense urban setting such as a large city, cells would be placed about a half a kilometer away while a rural area with less users might have cell spacing anywhere from five to ten kilometers distant, with capacity scaled to cell size. Dynamic bandwidth can be reallocated among cells as well if necessary and redundancy can be incorporated with network deployment. Carson stated it was harder to implement such features with traditional cellular architecture.
Reliability of data transmission during vehicle movement is another factor that Kincaid gave Flarion high marks on. Without being specific, he said tests had been successfully run in automobiles at up to 70 mph and “another vehicle” at speeds up to 200 mph. An obvious application would be to transmit video from a helicopter — or in the future, an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) — circling an incident from above to officials on scene and/or in a command center.
One of the prevailing themes underlined by both NGIT and Flarion is the use of open standards to establish common ground for interoperability among agencies and vendors supplying hardware and services. Flarion has submitted a number of proposals surrounding flash-OFDM to internationally recognized standards committees, including the IEEE 802 Mobile Broadband Wireless Access Standardization group and applicable ITU groups.
Kincaid envisions a number of competing vendors able to supply hardware that would work in a national 700 MHz IP network, but admits that he’s not sure who would handle IP address allocation, remarking “It’s a problem you’d like to have.”
Who currently uses the spectrum in question? It is allocated to UHF television broadcasters and includes channels 52-59. Kincaid points out that existing use of the spectrum is sporadic across the country, with many UHF channels now being delivered to homes through either cable or satellite broadcast.
In addition, the current spectrum should be vacated and available for reassignment once the migration to digital television is completed in 2007.
Of course, NGIT isn’t solely submitting the proposal for the public good. One system integrator has estimated the market for replacing and upgrading existing public service radio systems across the United States as a $15 billion to $20 billion market over the next 10 years.
Kincaid sees the construction of a national IP wireless public safety network as a major project that would use at least two large systems integrators and would include companies such as Boeing, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and SAIC.
“I think we’re ahead on the learning curve on this,” Kincaid said, “[Building the network] would be a competitive RFP issued at the state or national level. It’s a matter of who understands it the best and implements it the best.”
NGIT has already run a number of demonstrations and “solved problems” other bidders might not yet understand.
In short
Clients: Northrop Grumman IT provides services to all branches of the armed forces, federal civilian agencies, the national security community, state and local government, and commercial and international clients.
Year founded: 1939
Number of employees: 22,500
2002 sales volume: $4.2 billion
Web sites of interest
Flarion Technologies – www.flarion.com
Northrop Grumman IT Division – http://www.it.northropgrumman.com/index.html
