WASHINGTON - White House officials have announced that, unlike previous occasions, they intend to actually show up prepared for the next big international radio-frequency conference. This time, they swear.
Speaking at the ASCEND conference here May 19, officials declared they would finalize their positions well ahead of the World Radiocommunication Conference 2027 (WRC-27), scheduled for October and November 2027 in Shanghai. “This administration is the most serious about winning at WRC than the U.S. has probably ever been,” said Ryan Baasch, deputy director of the National Economic Council, setting the bar somewhere between “mildly interested” and “we remembered it was happening.”
The space industry is treating WRC-27 as critical, given that over 80% of the agenda deals with space applications of spectrum. Officials didn’t discuss specific issues but promised to make their stances clear long before the conference - a strategy that would represent a refreshing departure from the usual last-minute scrambling.
“I think, for the first time, the United States is going to have completed its slate of agenda items and positions well in advance of WRC,” said Charlie Powell, assistant director of space and spectrum at the Office of Science and Technology Policy, adding that they need time to “share and champion key U.S. positions with our allies and partners” - ideally before China does.
Speaking of China, the conference’s location in Shanghai has raised concerns about potential eavesdropping or undue influence. Powell said the administration was still figuring out security and delegation size but stressed the importance of showing up: “The U.S. government and U.S. industry have a lot to lose if other nations hijack these multilateral fora and tilt standards in a direction against U.S. industry.”
Amazon’s spectrum boss Alex Epshteyn noted that the company’s priorities include securing additional satellite spectrum in V-band and between 17.3 and 17.7 gigahertz, plus revising power flux density rules so non-geostationary orbit (NGSO) systems can operate at higher power without annoying the satellites in geostationary orbit. “WRC is very important from a perspective of looking at opening up more spectrum that can be usable for newcomers like us,” said Kim Baum, head of regulatory at Astranis, which wants more Ku-band uplink spectrum for its small GEO satellites.
Meanwhile, Planet’s deputy general counsel Danielle Pineres is worried about proposals to let terrestrial mobile services into the X-band used for downlinking imagery. “We want to ensure that this really critical piece of EESS spectrum is preserved for EESS use,” she said, essentially pleading “hands off our space Wi-Fi.”
Manny Shar of lunar rover developer Astrolab is following an agenda item that would allow certain spectrum bands on the lunar surface, needed to accommodate the projected deluge of moon missions. He acknowledged the WRC process is “very convoluted” but noted that spectrum “is a finite resource. It’s one of those critical pieces of the technology stack that needs to go right.”
In other words: the U.S. government is going to a conference, may have done some reading this time, and is worried about the host nation possibly listening in. Truly, the stars have aligned.