Could 5G Interfere With Weather Forecasting Accuracy?

Despite of the promise of blisteringly fast internet speed and much increased device connectivity, could 5G networks degrade our current weather forecasting ability back to the 1980s?

By: Ringo Bones

During trial runs in recent years, 5G networks – in prototype form - had managed to provide blisteringly fast internet speeds and quantum leaps in connectivity to our devices and hopefully, at data rates not much more expensive that we currently pay. But are there caveats to this increased internet speed and connectivity – as in degrading our current ability to provide accurate weather forecasting?

Since the mid 1990s, the ability of our meteorological satellites and supporting networks to provide accurate weather forecast have increased by leaps and bounds. Currently, we can track the severity of storms as it hits landfall by up to three days in advance. This resulted in countless lives being saved due to people evacuated to safer areas – an ability that just twenty years before, was thought of as just “science fiction”. But could 5G internet networks degrade our ability to provide accurate weather forecasts back to the early 1980s?

The radio frequencies used by 5G networks operate at around 24 GHz – a frequency quite close to the ones used by the sensors and transmitters of weather satellites. The radio frequency used by weather satellites / meteorological satellites takes advantage of how atmospheric water vapor in clouds and suspended ice crystals resonate at 23.8 GHz. Due to its close operating frequency, 5G internet networks could interfere with weather satellites when it comes to forecast accuracy. In recent trials, the degradation in accuracy can make a contemporary meteorological satellite operate as if it is using 1982 era technology in terms of weather forecasting accuracy.