Sebastian Barros: Using telecom networks for weather sensing requires a strategic telco shift from connectivity providers to ecosystem orchestrators

Telecom networks for weather sensing can be facilitated by using existing microwave links and 4G/5G signals as virtual sensors, detecting changes in signal strength and timing caused by rain, humidity, and temperature, effectively turning vast infrastructure into a dense, real-time atmospheric monitoring system for improved forecasting and disaster alerts, notes Sebastian Barros on Substack. By analyzing signal attenuation, telecom networks create high-resolution weather maps, complementing traditional methods like radar. Yet very few network operators or vendors have attempted to use telecommunications infrastructure for dense atmospheric sensing. The data exists but is rarely activated, processed, or disclosed.

Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) [1.] based atmospheric estimation, rain attenuation on microwave links, and radio refractivity effects have been studied for more than 20 years. The physics is well understood and already embedded in network planning and synchronization systems. There are eight million radio sites span cities, roads, ports, factories, and borders. Every site has power, compute, backhaul, antennas, timing, and regulatory protection. Today, the network only provides connectivity. Integrated Sensing and Communication (ISAC) starts to change that. It repurposes radio waves for radar-like sensing, including presence detection, velocity, Doppler shift, and range.

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Note 1. Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) is the umbrella term for satellite constellations like the U.S.’s GPS, Russia’s GLONASS, the EU’s Galileo, and China’s BeiDou, which provide global positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) services. GNSS receivers use signals from these orbiting satellites to calculate precise locations on Earth, offering increased accuracy and reliability compared to relying on a single system, enabling applications from smartphone navigation to autonomous vehicles and precision agriculture.

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How it Works: Multiple constellations of satellites orbit the Earth, constantly broadcasting signals containing their precise location and time.

Receiver: Your end point receiving device (phone, car navigation, etc.) picks up signals from several of these satellites.

Calculation: By measuring the time it takes for signals to arrive from at least four satellites, the receiver performs complex calculations (trilateration) to pinpoint your exact position.

Telecom networks can expose not just connectivity but structured awareness: object motion, crowd flow, anomalies, risks, and environmental state. In real time, across every continent. The infrastructure already exists. What’s missing is the architecture and the will to build the sensing layer on top of it. With dense, real-time sensing already in place, telecom can expose environmental intelligence through Open Gateway APIs, just as it exposes location or quality today. No new hardware. No new towers. Just activation, inference at the edge, and exposure.

In two Substack posts (see References below), Sebastian Barros describes the “platform gap” as the absence of a standard, accessible interface for the Integrated Sensing and Communication (ISAC) data generated by telecom networks. The platform gap encompasses several critical limitations:

Data Siloing: The data produced by ISAC currently remains locked within the physical (PHY) and Media Access Control (MAC) layers of the network. It is primarily used for internal network optimization and is not exposed to external applications or platforms.
Lack of Abstraction and APIs: There are no standard abstraction layers or Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) that would allow external systems (e.g., weather services, autonomous navigation systems, urban infrastructure management) to access and interpret the raw sensing data.
Absence of Data Fusion Standards: There is no standard methodology to fuse the output from ISAC with data from other sensing modalities (e.g., vision, audio, thermal sensors). This prevents the creation of a comprehensive, multimodal sensing mesh.
Missing Marketplace: The lack of standardized access and integration means there is no marketplace for this valuable data, which stifles innovation and collaboration across different industries that could benefit from real-world awareness information.

This platform gap means that while the physical capability for sensing exists, the data remains unusable for most practical, real-world applications beyond internal telecom operations. To realize the potential of telecom infrastructure as a vast sensor network, Barros argues that the industry must shift its focus from thinking in terms of mere connectivity and bandwidth to developing an open, abstracted, and multimodal sensing platform. Closing this platform gap for sensing data requires the telecom industry to undergo a strategic shift. This shift involves moving from providing simple connectivity to becoming ecosystem orchestrators that build open, abstracted platforms. It remains to be seen if that will happen, considering so many lost monetization opportunities telcos have missed.

References:

https://sebastianbarros.substack.com/p/telecom-built-the-worlds-best-weather

https://sebastianbarros.substack.com/p/telco-network-as-a-sensor-is-a-huge

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7413260481743769600/

https://www.euspa.europa.eu/eu-space-programme/galileo/what-gnss