Propagation and availability on E-band terrestrial radio

The development of wireless broadband terrestrial services are increasing the amount of transferred data, therefore the demand for new frequency bands, higher transmission speed or capacity is an actual problem. One of the possible solutions for this problem is the application of higher frequencies, for example the E-band. Point-to-point wireless devices are already available to transmit digital data even with Gbit/s speed. In order to fulfil the high availability requirements in mobile backhaul networks or other broadband solutions where these devices are applied, the propagation conditions are playing an important role. The atmospheric and the rain attenuation are the most important factors, besides the interference with other E-band devices, but the latter is not examined in this study. Our goal is to summarize the experiences in the field of E-band propagation. Nearly three years of measured data are available on 72.56 GHz in urban environment; attenuation and availability statistics and the measured rain intensity data are comparable. According to the measurements we provide empirical forms to approximate the attenuation statistics in the E-band, furthermore some design considerations will be also introduced to build up short range-few kilometres length-of radio connections with specific availability requirements.