This is the first in a series of explainer blogs on Complementary PNT by Merkhet Solutions adviser Pat Diamond
Sure, the jamming and spoofing of GPS is rampant in the Middle East, parts of southeastern Europe and along the borders between Norway, Finland, Sweden and Russia. At least it’s so reported.
What’s that got to do with us here in the US of A? After all, GPS is a warfighter’s tool. Sure, we use it to get around on the roads and backwaters of the continental U.S. We used to use paper maps, but GPS has made them obsolete, even collectors’ items in some cases. So what’s the big deal?
Simple: GPS has become an invisible utility that drives our economy, literally! For 20+ years, the U.S. government has been admiring the weaknesses and fragilities of GPS. There are 16 critical infrastructure industries that have adopted this utility.These industries have not only adopted timing from GPS; they have become dependent upon it, so much so that if this “utility” stopped being available, they would no longer be able to conduct their business after about 30 days. It was estimated some time ago by NIST that a GPS failure event would cost $1B per day. Frankly, this is a low number in real terms, but it is impactful!
Hundreds of thousands of people would be out of work, airlines would stop flying, banks would stop transacting, trains would stop running, the power grid would cease to provide power, wireless networks would stop allowing roaming and inter cell coverage, first responders would not be able to locate each other, the stock market would cease to operate…you get the idea. This could be the greatest catastrophe to ever hit the U.S.
If the government is aware of this, why hasn’t it done something about it? Truly one of the great questions from the 21st century. After all, China and Russia have GNSS systems similar to GPS; their industries are just as dependent. Why don’t we read about their weaknesses and dependencies? Simple: they both have backup systems, or, as we call it, CPNT backups. These adversaries recognized long ago the dependency on GNSS and did something about it! So what’s up with our government? It’s simple. Russia and China’s governments control the infrastructure technologies in their countries. Their governments built backups. Lastly, they know we have no backup! Talk about being exposed!
Let’s drill down a bit further. Firstly, these critical infrastructure industries cover the continental United States. That’s big! They are also owned by private industries, each with their own infrastructure and operating paradigms. The U.S.government has no authority or regulatory means to dictate how to run the business or protect it from harm. Not only that, but the U.S. government has no agency or secretariat capable of executing this backup implementation. Darn!That leaves us with a couple alternatives. One, do nothing but continue to admire the problem — not a good idea, in my opinion. Two, hope the individual industries collectively realize their peril and take action — right, that’s gonna happen. Three, establish a public-private governance mechanism where private industry and the U.S. government each brings their strengths and capabilities together in a joint process to develop and implement CPNT continentalU.S. (CONUS) wide. This approach has merit!
One such activity is already at play. A little background first. In order for a backup to GPS to be meaningful for our population, it needs to be CONUS wide. That greatly limits the potential partners. Second is understanding the CPNT issue in depth. CPNT is Complementary Position, Navigation and Timing technology. The simple reason GPS is so effective can be summed up in one sentence. GPS provides all the signal attributes necessary for a complete position, navigation and timing solution. Why, because these signals are transmitted from space and each arrives in exactly the same location repeatably. I am not going to explain these signals and how the GPS receiver can produce such remarkable accuracy from them. Point being, we all know they serve the purpose intended day in and day out.
Now a short discussion about the “signals” discussed. One of them is a timing signal that is synchronized to the USNO/NIST atomic clock farms and is used to correct timing errors of the atomic clocks on each GPS satellite. The daily correction process uses a system called WAAS, Wide Area Augmentation System. WAAS ensures each GPS bird’s “time” is synchronized to others within billionths of a second. Each satellite transmits a version of its value of “time” with high repeatability. This value of time is extracted by the GPS receiver and provided to the user equipment. This value of time is used in all critical infrastructure industries but is specifically depended upon by three of them.They are the power grid, mobile wireless networks and financial transaction markets.
Enough technical jargon and usage complexity discussion. This “time” critical infrastructure market subset is what I want to discuss going forward. This market subset has spawned an offshoot of the National Association of Broadcasters ATSC 3.0 NextGen TV protocol. The NAB invented a time transfer method called Broadcast Positioning System, BPS from here on. This is a mechanism allowing the ATSC 3.0 NextGen TV signal to broadcast a precise value of time equivalent to that broadcast from GPS. This precision has been confirmed by the NIST Boulder Time and Frequency department of the Department of Commerce, which is the organization within the U.S. responsible for establishing and maintaining Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), the international value of time used worldwide. This mumbo jumbo means the BPS signal is as good as GPS, CPNT capable and CONUS wide.
Stay tuned for more in the coming weeks.