[TxHam] Fwd: ARLB015 ARRL Files Federal Appeals Court Brief in Petition for Review of BPL Rules

[David Johnson KB5YLG]

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> SB QST @ ARL $ARLB015
> ARLB015 ARRL Files Federal Appeals Court Brief in
> Petition for 
> Review of BPL Rules
> 
> ZCZC AG15
> QST de W1AW  
> ARRL Bulletin 15  ARLB015
> From ARRL Headquarters  
> Newington CT  May 30, 2007
> To all radio amateurs 
> 
> SB QST ARL ARLB015
> ARLB015 ARRL Files Federal Appeals Court Brief in
> Petition for 
> Review of BPL Rules
> 
> The ARRL has filed a federal appeals court brief
> outlining its case
> and requesting oral arguments in its petition for
> review of the
> FCC's broadband over power line (BPL) rules. The
> League has
> petitioned the US Court of Appeals for the DC
> Circuit to review the
> FCC's October 2004 Report and Order (R&O) in ET
> Docket 04-37 and
> its 2006 Memorandum Opinion and Order. In its brief
> filed May 17,
> the ARRL contends, among other things, that the
> FCC's actions in
> adopting rules to govern unlicensed BPL systems
> fundamentally alter
> the longstanding rights of radio spectrum licensees,
> including
> Amateur Radio operators.
> 
> "For the first time ever, the FCC has permitted new
> unlicensed
> devices to operate in spectrum bands already
> occupied by licensees,
> even if the unlicensed operations cause harmful
> interference to the
> licensees," the League said in stating its case.
> "The orders under
> review reverse nearly seven decades of consistent
> statutory
> interpretation and upset the settled expectations of
> licensees
> without so much as acknowledging the reversal, let
> alone justifying
> it."
> 
> The ARRL argues that the FCC's approach to adopting
> rules to govern
> BPL flies in the face of Section 301 of the
> Communications Act,
> which requires that operators of devices that emit
> radio frequency
> energy first obtain an FCC license. "For years, the
> FCC has
> consistently read Section 301 to apply to
> unintentional radiators,
> such as BPL devices, and has expressly embodied that
> interpretation
> in its rules," the League's brief recounts.
> 
> The Commission then compounded its error by
> asserting that BPL
> devices do not fall within Section 301 at all, the
> League said.
> 
> The ARRL contends that the FCC orders under review
> "jeopardize the
> license rights of ARRL's members and other license
> holders by
> authorizing providers of a new device -- Access
> Broadband over Power
> Lines, or 'BPL' -- to send radio signals across the
> electric grid in
> the frequencies the license holders occupy, but
> without having to
> obtain an FCC license."
> 
> The League's brief further asserts that the FCC "has
> failed to
> discuss or disclose significant information in the
> record that
> potentially contradicts its key interference
> findings." The
> Commission not only withheld its internal studies
> until it was too
> late to comment, the ARRL alleges, but has yet to
> release portions
> of studies that may not support its own conclusions.
> 
> The ARRL wants the appeals court to determine if the
> Commission
> acted in an arbitrary and capricious manner for not
> disclosing
> "significant information that potentially
> contradicts its key
> interference finding," the League said in its brief.
> 
> The League also has taken issue with what it argues
> is the FCC's
> "arbitrary and capricious" adoption of a BPL
> emission measurement
> standard that's unsupported by the record in the
> proceeding and
> ignores contrary evidence.
> 
> The ARRL brief asserts that, for the first time
> ever, the FCC "has
> authorized the operation of unlicensed devices that
> it concedes
> interfere with licensed devices" and has declared
> that such devices
> "may continue operating even where proven to cause
> interference."
> 
> The FCC, ARRL contends, has concluded that BPL's
> acknowledged
> interference risks are manageable, but it bases that
> conclusion --
> which ARRL calls "the linchpin of the challenged
> orders" -- on FCC
> studies the Commission has declined to make public
> in unedited form.
> 
> The FCC's response to the League's brief is due July
> 2.
> NNNN
> /EX
>