Current standards and Regulations for Vehicle-Mounted Earth Stations and their impact on performance

Vehicle-Mounted Earth Stations (VMESs), also known as satellite communications on-the-move (SOTM) terminals, are satellite communication terminals that are mounted on land vehicles. These are new communication terminals that are important in both military and commercial applications. A key distinguishing feature of these satellite terminals is the potential interference to other satellites because of motion-induced antenna pointing errors. To accommodate the operation of these terminals at the Ku frequency band many national and international standards and regulatory agencies have established requirements on the effective isotropic radiated power (EIRP) from these terminals so that the resulting interference is controlled. This paper will describe and analyze the salient features of ITU-R Recommendation S.1857, FCC Regulation $25.226, and the ETSI standard EN 302 977.