First White Space License Brings Broadband in Boucher’s District
The FCC’s first white space license brought wireless broadband to a small community in Virginia, in a launch announced Wednesday by House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher, D-Va. Business leaders involved in the project said more spectrum is needed to facilitate wireless broadband. But movement on comprehensive wireless legislation won’t come until “probably next year,” Boucher told reporters after a Capital Hill event that was connected to the town using the new apparatus. Work on universal service and online privacy legislation will precede movement of a comprehensive wireless framework bill, Boucher said: “It’s going to take a little bit of time, but that’s a priority before us.”
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Boucher and FCC Commissioner Michael Copps helped facilitate the $40,000 project bringing broadband to Claudville, Va., a rural town of about 900 people 10 miles from the Patrick County seat. It has “been a challenge” to bring broadband using federal funds to the area because of stringent rules on broadband grants and loans, Boucher said.
“You are seeing today the first signal that is generated from white spaces, I'm told, anywhere in the world,” Boucher said. The FCC issued white space technology firm Spectrum Bridge the first experimental license made possible by an FCC rule adopted last year. Spectrum Bridge worked with local community officials in partnership with Microsoft and Dell to provide equipment for the project, including seven computers, allowing a school, cafe and fish hatchery in Claudville to deliver free broadband service for 18 months. Spectrum Bridge will monitor any potential signal interference with TV stations operating near its spectrum, said CEO Richard Licursi. It’s an “ideal” study that can provide real-time information that could lead to wider deployment of similar efforts, Licursi said.
Asked whether such projects could face obstacles if the FCC enacts net neutrality rules, Boucher said “it is too early” to judge and that he plans a “more detailed comment” when he sees the proposal. But he said there are questions about whether services using broader bandwidth should be treated the same as those employing lower speeds. “It is far more feasible to apply the principles” to services that have broader bandwidth, he said. Based on initial information “it looks as if all providers will be required to comply,” he said: “In the end, the network neutrality principle has to be practical.” Boucher said he supports FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski’s effort to move a rulemaking forward and would not “speculate on a series of events that have not occurred,” such as potential litigation if rules are adopted, or action in Congress.
A videoconference using the new service linked Claudville residents with Boucher in a meeting room on Capitol Hill. It provided clear but somewhat jerky video and good audio. The project provides users with free broadband at speeds from 6 to 12 Mbps. The stream used one unoccupied TV channel, but more are available that could be tapped, said Spectrum Bridge CTO Peter Stanforth. “We need more spectrum” to facilitate projects like this, Licursi said.