The value of sensing for TV White Spaces

The main challenge to allow for use of the so-called TV White Spaces is to achieve a reliable approach for detecting presence of licensed users ensuring that harmful interference to television signals and other incumbent services does not occur. In the current debate, there is a trend towards the use of a geo-location database only, driven by the fear that other techniques fail to achieve the required detection reliability. Therefore, in this paper we intend to assess if the technical and business value of sensing in the context of TVWS should be neglected. Taking in consideration the discussion on the adequate technical requirements currently taking place in Europe and the USA, the cost and performance of the proposed techniques for local sensing, distributed sensing and geo-location database are compared through a simple model. As a result, we conclude that using a distributed sensing solution based on low-cost low-power sensing engines, we could achieve a solution with hardware and energy costs a par with the geo-location database. However, by assessing the costs and business impacts for stakeholders such as manufacturers and White Spaces Service Providers we conclude that in the geo-location database solution, regulators, White Spaces Service Providers, White Spaces Database Providers and consumers may incur additional infrastructure, maintenance and administrative costs compared to a distributed sensing solution. Consequently, we are of the opinion that the distributed sensing solution in the context of TVWS does indeed present value and its business and technical impact should be considered in further research and regulatory activities.