New Home Products Create Invisible Airwave Pollution
When President Reagan visits his ranch near Santa Barbara, some residents more than 100 miles away in San Bernardino are among the first to know--their garage door openers go on the blink.
The reason: A special plane stationed at March Air Force Base in nearby Riverside for White House communications shares the same frequencies as those used to open the garage doors and plays havoc with the radio signals.
The phenomenon is one of many resulting from a growing dilemma that faces this nation as the explosion in communications technology expands the wealth of new “information age” services. On the one hand, these developments revolutionize the way businesses and individuals communicate; on the other, the plethora of advances increases demands for the nation’s airwaves and adds to the possibility of interruptions and interference to new services.
More Interference Found
Today, as consumers add more products to their home that use such radio waves to function--from doorbells to personal computers--they are finding more interference on their TV sets, radios, stereos and video cassette recorders.
“It’s really a pollution problem,” says communications consultant Dale N. Hatfield of Boulder, Colo.
If so, it is an invisible pollution of the “electromagnetic spectrum”--the airwaves through which radio waves pass. For communications purposes, the spectrum is sliced into strips known as frequencies that the federal government allocates to businesses and law enforcement agencies for a wide range of services, including radios and walkie-talkies.
At the Federal Communications Commission, whose satellite-monitoring facility is in Laurel, officials are concerned about how to parcel out the remaining segments of this extraterrestrial electronic real estate. As Commissioner Dennis R. Patrick says, “the interference problem may continue to intensify as technology makes available more and more diverse potential uses for the spectrum.”
Can Come From Many Sources
Interference problems emanate from devices that use radio waves. Today, that means dozens of services and products, including light dimmers, pacemakers, CB radios, personal computers and even a new type of light bulb.
The FCC, which assigns spectrum frequencies and monitors their use, received 66,794 complaints involving interference in 1984 alone. The bulk of the complaints dealt with interference to TVs, radios and other common home entertainment devices.
And many of those problems could be traced to one source: CB radios, notably the illegal amplifiers used to boost CB power. Those devices can send CB operators’ voices booming into their neighbors’ TV sets and radios. The FCC has stepped up its efforts to locate the operators of illegal amplifiers and ferret out the dealers who sell them after a study last summer showed that 57% of the reported complaints of interference to home electronic entertainment equipment were caused by overpowered CB stations.
Not surprisingly, FCC officials are pleased that the CB fad has declined.
Although 80% of the complaints to the FCC are handled by mail, the agency’s field offices use sophisticated technology and specially equipped cars to track the serious offenders. Once the violators are found, the agency’s work really begins. FCC inspectors, whose only weapon is their badge, have been shot at and attacked by guard dogs.
Recalls Case at Airport
Richard M. Smith, head of the FCC’s field operations bureau, recalls a case in which the Federal Aviation Administration complained that a radio signal was causing interference to an instrument landing system at Los Angeles International Airport.
Smith, who was then an inspector, and a colleague traced the signal to a car parked behind an industrial building. After they arrived, a man ran out of the building to the car, opened its trunk and ripped out a black box. The man turned out to be a jealous husband conducting his own surveillance on his wife, using the box as a type of homing device.
Robert M. Mroz, director of the FCC’s Baltimore district office, recalls another incident, in which police planted a similar homing device on the car of a suspected criminal. The driver then apparently found the tracking mechanism and threw it away.
But the discarded device continued to emit signals that interfered with other police communications, so the police called FCC investigators, who located it on the bottom of a lake 20 feet from shore.
New Equipment Examined
While FCC investigators look for problems with products already on the market, an FCC laboratory reviews product applicants and examines equipment for potential harmful interference. The lab has had requests for just about everything, including one proposal for an ultrasonic false teeth cleaner.
In some cases, however, products get on the market before their potential for interference is discovered.
Of serious concern to FCC officials at present are the effects of the recent boom in personal computers. Such computers, now numbering in the millions, operate on digitized circuitry with miniature transmitters that can emit signals.
The FCC adopted rules for the computers after a spate of complaints. Among them: Several Western police departments said coin-operated electronic video games caused interference with highway communications; personal computer owners complained that computers disrupted TV reception; and officials at a major airport complained of interference to aeronautical safety communications, which was traced to a drugstore’s electronic cash register a mile away.
Believe Making Progress
Nevertheless, FCC officials believe that they are making progress with the problem. They have confiscated a multimillion-dollar inventory of computers from one company that violated the federal standards. Still, they concede, it is difficult to deal with products already on the market. And they caution consumers that, while a computer may cause no interference, the addition of components like modems and printers can create problems.
“I still have concerns about personal computers,” says Thomas B. Stanley, chief engineer in the FCC’s office of engineering and technology. “Maybe it is time to revisit that issue.”
And, as technological progress in the communications field reaches new heights, the FCC will undoubtedly encounter more difficulty in weighing conflicting demands for new services vying for space on an increasingly limited spectrum.
“It’s just like every other precious thing,” Hatfield says. “Everybody wants it.”
