CEPT Workshop on Spectrum Occupancy Measurements

CEPT Workshop on How Measurement of Spectrum Occupancy Can Help Spectrum Management 

Organised by the Working Group Frequency Management (WG FM) of the ECC

15 January 2014, Mainz (Germany)

The WGFM Project Team FM 22 discussed in April 2013 the technical aspects of monitoring concepts such as the Microsoft Spectrum Observatory (Microsoft opened in early 2013 a first fixed observatory station in Europe, in Brussels). This was subsequently reported to the WGFM and the ECC.

To manage spectrum more effectively and increase usage efficiency, frequency regulators want to know how the different frequency bands are being used and which are being underused or left vacant. This has always been part of the considerations in frequency management within administrations and has recently been emphasised by the adoption of the Radio Spectrum Policy Programme adopted by the European Parliament and the Council which includes a spectrum inventory process (in Article 9 of the RSPP).

Therefore, the question on how spectrum occupancy measurements can help the spectrum management and related questions such as a common storage area for spectrum usage data to be collected, analysed, and presented to those interested in understanding wireless spectrum utilisation needs to be addressed more in detail and the ECC therefore decided that a CEPT Workshop should be staged to address those issues.

Another aspect is to which extent spectrum occupancy measurements could also provide some information that could be used to identify unused spectrum at a given location, i.e. frequency usage opportunities for other radio applications. This relates to the developments at this stage towards the future use of sensing approaches for spectrum access mechanisms in many areas.

During the Workshop on 15 January 2015 in Mainz, Germany, presentations about fixed and mobile monitoring approaches have been discussed. 68 participants attended the workshop.

See detailed workshop programme: here.

Biographies of the speakers: here

Abstracts of the presentations:here

The report of this ECC Workshop is available in document ECC(14)008-Annex04-Rev1 on the ECC website.

The ECC has also agreed an ECC Statement with regard to the results of the Workshop on 14 March 2014.

Workshop Panelists:

The ECC Chairman during the Panel Session:

For further information, contact

Mr Thomas Weber ([email protected])

European Communications Office