Pollution of a different kind

From Slashdot comes this story at BBC News bq. Forecasters face losing key tools Meteorologists fear they are losing one of their essential forecasting tools - microwave frequencies uniquely able to "see" through clouds from satellites. bq. They say commercial applications, for example mobile phones and collision avoidance systems, are ruining them. And more -- this from Dr Stephen English, manager of the satellite radiance assimilation group at the UK Met Office.: bq. He told the BBC: "Microwave observations are vital because they see through cloud - this is not possible in any other frequency band. bq. "We only need a few narrow-frequency bands for Earth remote-sensing, but most of these are unique, so there is no alternative. bq. "These bands are primarily used for temperature, water vapour, sea ice, clouds (ice and liquid), and rainfall and snowfall estimation. bq. "We use them as well for monitoring surface snowpack, soil moisture and sea surface temperature." bq. A meteorologists' working group on frequency management says protecting key regions of the microwave spectrum for passive remote-sensing is "a dramatic challenge", because of "the huge pressure of the commercial and military telecoms". bq. Two important bands (6.8 GHz and 10.7 GHz) have been lost already for use over land, but in the next few years the threat is likely to spread to other bands. bq. There is particular concern about protecting the 23.6-24 GHz band, which has the unique property of being sensitive to water vapour but not to liquid water. bq. Dr English said: "There is no other frequency where this occurs. But car 'radars' will now be allowed to broadcast in this frequency band." Astronomers have the same sort of problems with unshielded street lights and those @#$% mercury "security lights" that people put on their homes...