President Obama Outlines Goal to Ensure 98% of Americans Have Access to Broadband Internet

On February 10, President Obama traveled to Marquette, Michigan to speak on the state of broadband access in America, and to give details about the National Wireless Initiative, a goal he announced during his State of the Union address. The plan aims to expand 4-G wireless broadband Internet access to 98 percent of Americans. The President spoke primarily about mobile broadband coverage, but as Speed Matters has noted, expanding the wireless broadband network is no substitute for upgrading our nation's wired data networks.

A significant part of the President's plan involves freeing up additional spectrum currently used by television broadcasters through an auction process and repurposing it for mobile broadband. But even with additional spectrum available, demand for mobile bandwidth will place enormous stress on our wireless infrastructure. The FCC recently reported that the number of wireless devices is "skyrocketing", and these new devices are consuming significantly more data than ever before. Cisco predicts a 26-fold increase in wireless data traffic over the next five years alone. While engineers have made progress in increasing wireless efficiency by transmitting more data on an equal amount of spectrum, a fiber connection has much more capacity than a wireless network. Moreover, the faster wireless data can be put into a terrestrial wired network, the less expensive it is to operate the network.

Even with additional spectrum and technological advances, wireless broadband will face capacity constraints as households and businesses move to simultaneous transmission of bandwidth intensive applications such as two-way video health consultations, distance learning, and smart appliances. It is noteworthy that President Obama's broadband initiative proposes five billion dollars to build out wired as well as 4G wireless networks in rural areas.

Policymakers need to focus on initiatives to upgrade our wired infrastructure to get us to the National Broadband Plan goal of 100 Mb broadband access to 100 million homes by 2020.

The President on the National Wireless Initiative: "We're Going to Have to Up Our Game, Marquette" (White House)

Speed Matters: Proliferation of Wireless Devices Requires Robust Broadband Connections (Speed Matters)

From the FCC Lab: Report On Trends in Wireless Devices (FCC)

Cisco sees 26-fold wireless data increase in 5 years (CNet)

President Obama Details Plan to Win the Future through Expanded Wireless Access (White House)