Radar EMC in the Space Age

This paper is based on a recent study-in-depth of the current radar situation in the United States. It is intended here to define, on the basis of the data offered by this study, radar´s contribution to the electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) environment of today and for the next decade. It will be shown that the current maximum in radar power output, about 200 megawatts peak, is constrained by a number of technological factors to remain quite static throughout this period; what will increase, and in rapid fashion, is the actual number of these high-powered radiators. What this will mean to the space-age EMC engineer will be determined by blocking out the dimensions of the current problem, and then extrapolating to a point, say, ten years hence by the geographical multiplication suggested. It will be shown first that the present situation wrought by high-power radar is not encouraging from the EMC standpoint, and, secondly, that it should be the mission of EMC agents to arrest today´s problems and then outpace the predictable increase in these offenders. The prediction is that they will; the Herculean efforts of the early EMC pioneers have given us today a highly receptive audience, in government and in industry. In the radar area the cooperation is better than average; a healthy awareness of problems of interference and their ramifications is in evidence and well documented.