Federal spectrum officials say the era of years-long studies and slow-moving coordination is ending, as new congressional deadlines and closer Federal Communications Commission (FCC)–National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) cooperation push the government to free up more airwaves for artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies.
Spectrum bands typically undergo a long process consisting of spectrum studies conducted by the NTIA and then move to auction processes overseen by the FCC before the commercial sector can use them.
The One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB) passed by Congress last summer changed those processes by requiring tighter deadlines and opening commercial access to upper C-band spectrum, NTIA and FCC officials said during a Center for Strategic and International Studies event.
“We have a lot of work ahead of us; it’s a very aggressive timeline. We have to propose rules, adopt rules, finalize auction procedures, begin an auction and finish an auction, and under two years,” said Arpan Sura, senior counsel to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, referring to OBBB requirements that the FCC auction at least 100 MHz of upper C-band spectrum by mid-2027.
To make spectrum available, the NTIA must study how federal agencies use those bands, assess the impact of relocating agency systems, and craft transition plans. Those analyses slow the process, but new deadlines and stronger coordination are speeding things up, officials said.
“Coordination is going really well during the government shutdown,” said Brooke Donilon, NTIA chief of staff, explaining that IRAC, the interagency committee that advises NTIA on federal spectrum use, continued operations during the government shutdown, which recently ended after more than 40 days.
“NTIA has [also] been working on band study plans for 2.7 and 4.4 so that we can quickly have those out the door when the government reopens … we all understand the problems ahead and are working together,” Donilon said.
A major part of NTIA’s push has been reframing spectrum reallocation as a “win-win” for federal agencies, encouraging them to view transitions as opportunities for system upgrades.
“It doesn’t always have to be ‘this is what you’re going to lose,’ if you focus on ‘this is what you can gain,’” Donlin said.
Still, NTIA must follow statutory requirements tied to the Spectrum Relocation Fund, including evaluating the operational impacts of moving federal systems off a band. Donilon said those legal guardrails limit how fast studies can go, even with new momentum.
While high-speed studies may not possible, Sura said that the FCC has been trying to get rid of “excessive proceduralism.”
“Time has economic value. Every single day of delay is a day that somebody is losing money or something valuable. And as regulators, that’s something we have to keep in mind when we’re doing federal coordination, when we’re doing band studies, when we’re getting applications reviewed and cleared,” Sura said.
In the future, Donlin said that the NTIA is aiming to “make as much federal spectrum available as possible, as quickly as possible,” and said that the agency plans to meet its congressional mandate “ideally early.”