Effective utilization of the geostationary orbit for satellite communication

The geostationary satellite orbit has a finite capacity for communication satellites operating in the frequency spectrum available, but saturation could be delayed for a long time if various practices and principles of system design and use were agreed internationally and applied. Three broad areas are identified where action is needed, namely system engineering for an interference-limited environment, intersystem coordination of the use of orbit and the spectrum, and the ordering of the use of orbit and spectrum so that systems with radically different characteristics do not interfere. In each of the three areas, the main factors of concern ate identified, the benefits that would be achieved are deduced in broad terms, and the practical and economic feasibility of actually securing the benefit is reviewed for each factor.