The annual discussion with Ofcom surrounding the extension of the NoVs for
500kHz took place at the Ofcom/RSGB Forum yesterday.  This followed a
request at the September Forum meeting and was backed up with a short paper
issued to them at the end November.  

Apart from requesting a further year's continuation of the NoV I have asked
if it will be possible to increase the ERP to +10dBW in order to bring it in
line with licence conditions in some other countries.  

Ofcom will obviously need to consult with the Maritime and Coastguard Agency
(MCA) and were asking questions about the coverage at this higher ERP level.
They were also asking whether we would accept a tighter definition on
transmit bandwidth.  This is to be more assured of not causing problems to
services within the Maritime Mobile band 505 - 510kHz and I guess for the
NoVs to be more compliant with the Radio Regulations footnotes 5.82A and
5.82B for 495 - 505kHz.    

Getting a higher ERP limit will not necessarily be to everyone's liking,
however, it may help investigation of the deep fades and also help those in
high noise level environments.  The ERP level and transmit bandwidth will
probably be negotiable, but my aim is to achieve maximum flexibility in use
of telegraphy and the narrower digimodes.  Would 200Hz be sufficient or
would we need a little more?

Assuming that MCA approve of continuing the arrangements Ofcom indicated
that their preference for extending the NoV would be as last year. This is
to issue new NoVs to existing holders, anyone who no longer needs their NoV
can return the documents.  

Comments appreciated, either direct of on the reflector.

Seasonal Greetings to all

73 John, G3WKL
RSGB HF Manager

[email protected]