Climate change investigation applying microwave measurements

For microwave telecommunications links that are operating above 10 GHz one of the most harmful circumstantial factors is the attenuation caused by precipitation, especially by rain. In order to investigate this phenomenon a measurement system is operating at Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Department of Broadband Infocommunicatons and Electromagnetic Theory (BME-HVT), which system measures the received signal level values on microwave links established in many locations in Hungary. Furthermore, the results of the measurement system help to examine the change of the climate as well. Our aim is to study the effects of the climate change by processing the attenuation measurement data on microwave links recorded during the last 14 years. In this paper the changes occurred in the duration and frequency of the fade events were investigated.