US National Broadband Plan

The National Broadband Plan aims to provide a comprehensive strategy for ensuring every American has access to high-speed broadband. Recognising broadband as the critical infrastructure challenge of the 21st century, the plan highlights the transformative power of broadband in driving economic growth, enhancing global competitiveness, and improving quality of life. Like electricity and telephony before it, broadband is seen as essential for innovation, job creation, and the efficient delivery of services across various sectors including healthcare, education, energy, public safety, and government operations.

Key Objectives and Strategy:

1. Ensure Universal Access:
   • Deployment: Ensure that every American has access to broadband services with sufficient capabilities. Addressing the broadband availability gap is a primary focus, as 14 million Americans currently lack access to broadband infrastructure capable of supporting today’s applications.
   • Affordability: Create mechanisms to ensure that broadband is affordable for all Americans, including expanding programs like Lifeline and Link-Up for broadband services.
   • Digital Literacy: Promote digital literacy to ensure that all Americans have the skills necessary to take full advantage of broadband.
2. Promote Competition and Innovation:
   • Infrastructure: Foster competition in the broadband market by ensuring efficient allocation and management of spectrum, poles, conduits, rooftops, and rights-of-way. Encourage private investment and innovation in network upgrades and service delivery.
   • Policy Reform: Reform laws and policies to support competitive entry and network upgrades. This includes updating rules for wireless backhaul, ensuring transparency in spectrum allocation, and developing a more flexible spectrum policy.
3. Leverage Government Influence:
   • Universal Service: Reform the Universal Service Fund to support broadband deployment in high-cost areas and ensure that low-income Americans can afford broadband.
   • Sectoral Impact: Update policies and standards to maximise the benefits of broadband in sectors such as public education, healthcare, energy, and government operations. This involves integrating broadband into the operations and service delivery of these sectors to improve efficiency and outcomes.
4. Set Long-term Goals and Benchmarks:
   • Performance Targets: Establish specific benchmarks for broadband performance and availability, such as ensuring at least 100 million U.S. homes have access to download speeds of at least 100 Mbps and upload speeds of 50 Mbps by 2020.
   • Mobile Innovation: Lead the world in mobile innovation by making 500 MHz of spectrum available for broadband by 2020, with an interim goal of 300 MHz by 2015.
   • Community Access: Ensure every American community has access to at least 1 Gbps broadband service for anchor institutions such as schools, hospitals, and government buildings.
5. Encourage Civic Engagement and Government Efficiency:
   • Digital Government: Improve government performance and transparency through broadband. Enhance civic engagement by providing platforms for meaningful interaction between citizens and government.
   • Public Safety: Support the deployment of a nationwide interoperable public safety mobile broadband network to improve emergency response and homeland security.

Implementation and Collaboration:

The plan emphasises the need for ongoing public input and collaboration between the FCC, other government agencies, Congress, state and local governments, and the private sector. It acknowledges that the plan must evolve to reflect technological advancements and market developments. A significant portion of the recommendations focuses on the FCC’s actions, including publishing a timetable for implementation, creating a Broadband Data Depository, and conducting annual evaluations of progress.