The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is currently evaluating a significant petition from NextNav, a company proposing to reconfigure a portion of the radio spectrum known as the Lower 900 MHz band — a range of frequencies between 902 MHz and 928 MHz that is widely used today by a broad array of wireless devices. NextNav’s petition seeks to restructure this spectrum and grant the company a nationwide license to deploy a 5G-based terrestrial positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) network that would complement and provide a backup to the U.S. Global Positioning System (GPS). In its filings, NextNav emphasizes the importance of a resilient alternative to GPS, particularly for indoor positioning and location services where satellite signals can be weak or unavailable. The company argues that terrestrial PNT could improve critical services such as emergency response, bolster national infrastructure, and enhance location accuracy in buildings and complex environments.
The proposal has attracted substantial attention because the Lower 900 MHz band is not an unused portion of spectrum. It currently supports a wide variety of unlicensed “Part 15” devices that operate without individual licenses, including wireless security systems, panic buttons, smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, medical alert pendants, access control systems, smart home automation technologies, RAIN RFID and LoRa devices, and other life safety and property protection equipment. These systems depend on reliable low-power radio communication across the band, often as a backbone for alarm signaling, remote monitoring, and wireless data transmission.
Industry stakeholders and technical experts have raised concerns that NextNav’s reconfiguration, which would allocate a large portion of the band for high-power 5G transmissions, could crowd out or interfere with these existing devices. Engineering research commissioned by major security and alarm associations indicates that the introduction of powerful, cellular-like signals in the band could reduce the effective range and reliability of devices critical to public safety and property protection. In some scenarios, interference could compromise the ability of alarms to transmit signals reliably, degrade the performance of life safety communications, and affect everyday devices that contribute to situational awareness and emergency response.
At the same time, proponents of the proposal highlight the need for better indoor location accuracy for first responders, noting that GPS alone can be insufficient in multi-story structures or urban environments. They argue that a terrestrial PNT system could provide floor-level location information during emergencies, improving situational awareness and potentially reducing response times. Supporters at a First Responder Indoor Tracking Summit expressed urgency in developing complementary technologies to GPS that could operate in areas where satellite navigation fails.
For life safety and property protection agencies, this issue underscores the complex balance between innovation in emergency communications and protection of existing safety infrastructure. Agencies should approach this proposal with clear priorities: ensuring that changes to spectrum management do not diminish the reliability of current alarm and safety systems, and advocating for solutions that are compatible with the wide range of devices already deployed to protect homes, businesses, schools, and critical infrastructure.
Professional organizations and agencies should engage with the FCC proceeding by submitting technical comments, supporting engineering studies, and highlighting the operational realities of life safety communications. It is vital to provide regulators with detailed information about how current devices operate, what interference risks might look like in real-world environments, and how any transition could be managed without disrupting service. Collaborative technical analysis, rather than speculation, will help ensure that spectrum policy decisions protect the public interest. Agencies may also consider forming or joining industry coalitions to provide unified input that reflects a broad range of operational perspectives.
In internal planning and advocacy, life safety and property protection professionals should prepare both to articulate the value and spectrum needs of existing technologies and to assess proposed future systems that could benefit public safety. This includes encouraging the FCC to require robust coexistence testing, clear interference mitigation measures, and protections for the reliability of life safety communications before adopting any new rules.
The NextNav proposal has not yet been adopted, and the FCC continues to review comments and technical data from industry stakeholders, government agencies, and technology proponents. What remains essential is that life safety and property protection agencies remain informed, engaged, and proactive in contributing to the record. Ensuring that spectrum policy decisions preserve the integrity of life safety systems while assessing the merits of new technologies is critical to maintaining both innovation and public safety.