Deputy DOT Secretary and Aviation Industry Complain of LightSquared

Porcari, who is co-chair of the National Executive Committee for Space-Based Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT), said LightSquared’s service would create real dangers. “LightSquared’s proposal would require constant, individual monitoring and adjustments to over 40,000 broadcasting sites nationwide, to ensure that they could be, and would remain, consistent with air safety requirement,” he said in written testimony. “This is simply not practical."

Based on extensive testing “there appears to be no practical solutions or mitigations that would permit the LightSquared broadband service, as proposed, to operate in the next few months or years without significantly interfering with GPS,” Porcari said. Porcari voiced similar concern in a PNT report on LightSquared given to NTIA (CD Jan 18 p7), which is considering the report and will eventually advise the FCC on how to proceed. The FCC didn’t comment.

Porcari said the dispute points to the need for new standards. “We propose to work with NTIA to draft new GPS spectrum interference standards” to “help inform future proposals for non-space, commercial uses in the bands adjacent to the GPS signals, to strengthen existing national policy protection of adjacent band spectrum,” he said. LightSquared on Tuesday said the FCC should begin a long-term proceeding to address the need for GPS receiver standards to allow for increased regulatory certainty in the adjacent bands.

The fight over LightSquared also shows some “vulnerability” in the GPS system and the aviation industry’s dependence on it, noted Rep. Blake Farenthold, R-Texas. Porcari agreed there are some flaws to the system “by its very nature.” Some of those flaws will be addressed in the coming NextGen navigation system for air transportation that’s based on GPS in place of radar.

Industry representatives were highly critical of LightSquared and the FCC. PNT sign-off should be required “when proceedings before the FCC include documented or substantiated claims of potential interference to GPS,” said John Foley, director of aviation GNSS technology, Garmin International. Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association President Craig Fuller pushed the “FCC to rescind waivers that keep this cloud” over industries using GPS.

LightSquared was unhappy it was excluded from the hearing. “LightSquared was denied a seat at the witness stand,” said a spokesman. “Despite repeated requests, we were told there was no need to testify because LightSquared was not the subject of the hearing. We are dismayed but not surprised to hear today that this hearing was little more than a one-sided trial of LightSquared in absentia. It’s outrageous that a congressional hearing set up to examine factual issues was only focused on one side of the story -- a side of the story supported by commercial GPS makers who designed faulty devices that depend on using spectrum licensed to LightSquared."

LightSquared’s largest investor, Harbinger Capital Partners, also voiced annoyance over the hearing and other Capitol Hill treatment. “In their review of LightSquared’s proposal to build and operate a new nationwide wireless data system that will enhance competition, provide meaningful broadband wireless service to rural America, some Members of Congress are giving unfair and unequal treatment to LightSquared,” said a Harbinger spokesman. “Despite this single-issue focus of the hearing, LightSquared’s request to be included among panel members testifying before the Subcommittee was denied, leaving the deck stacked entirely against LightSquared. It is unfair to the American public and to LightSquared that creation of a competitive new nationwide broadband wireless system could be considered in this hearing with only one point of view represented.”

"Our intention was to move beyond the LightSquared controversy to focus on how to protect GPS going forward,” said Aviation Subcommittee Chairman Tom Petri, R-Wis., in an emailed statement. “A fully functioning GPS is essential for air traffic modernization and public safety in all modes of transportation. I have nothing against LightSquared and understand that they want to provide a valuable service. I just have to make sure that nothing interferes with GPS, and aviation safety in particular.”

Harbinger also went after Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, who is seeking documents from the FCC, Harbinger and the GPS industry on the process that led to LightSquared’s conditional waiver to offer terrestrial service. “We think that actions by Senator Grassley’s office clearly demonstrate that we have been singled out for unfair treatment,” said the Harbinger spokesman. “Grassley’s document request to GPS manufacturers was much narrower than the request to LightSquared and Harbinger, and lets the GPS community off the hook from having to turn over documents covering a key time period in the process. Even so, the GPS manufacturers have not provided a single document in response to the Senator’s request. The Senator has not publicly complained at all about this lack of responsiveness. We have been told that he has granted GPS makers an indefinite extension. This is far different from the way we have been treated. This chain of events demonstrates a fundamental lack of fairness and transparency in Sen. Grassley’s so-called impartial investigation. We believe that if the documents had been produced, they would show far more extensive lobbying of various Federal agencies by the GPS manufacturers than by LightSquared."

Grassley defended his investigation. “Senator Grassley’s investigation isn’t about the companies,” said a spokeswoman by email. “It’s about whether the FCC is doing its job to make decisions in the public’s best interest. The agency’s rapid approval of the LightSquared project raised questions about the process, which led to Senator Grassley’s requests for materials first from the FCC. When the FCC refused to comply, Senator Grassley sought documents from LightSquared and Harbinger Capital. When LightSquared and Harbinger suggested that Senator Grassley was less than fair because he did not also ask for documents from the GPS industry, he asked for documents from the GPS industry as well. However, all of the document requests are related to the waiver that LightSquared received from the FCC. The FCC’s waiver to LightSquared has been the focus of Senator Grassley’s investigation since April, and that will not change.”