Selecting the optimal orbit location for a Canadian EHF communications satellite

Rain fade depths at EHF (30/20 GHz) frequencies are very high and this paper shows that by properly choosing the satellite orbit location we can reduce the variation in required rain fade margin over the service areas and to some extent the amount of over-design required to serve equally well all users. For a Canadian EHF geostationary satellite, it is shown that the optimal subsatellite longitude is around 92.5/spl deg/W. Existing Canadian orbital slots are all west of this optimal location and the penalty for use of these non-optimal locations is on the order of 2 dB at 30 GHz for a 99.75% availability.<
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