Spectrum Sharing in Low-Earth Orbit Satellite Systems Under an Interference Protection Constraint

This work investigates the in-band coexistence between two dense low-earth orbit (LEO) satellite communication systems by analyzing two preeminent large-scale constellations, namely Starlink and Kuiper, both which have been granted non-exclusive rights to operate at 20 GHz. Through extensive simulation of Starlink and Kuiper based on their public filings, we examine downlink performance of both systems when Kuiper is obliged to protect Starlink by not inflicting prohibitive interference onto its ground users. We show that Kuiper is capable of reliably satisfying a strict protection constraint at virtually all times by strategically selecting which overhead satellites are used to serve its ground users. In fact, while protecting Starlink users in this way, our results show that Kuiper can remarkably also deliver near-maximal downlink SINR to its own ground users, revealing a feasible route to fruitful coexistence of both systems. For instance, as the constellations orbit the globe, we show that Kuiper is always capable of keeping its inflicted interference at least 12 dB below noise and in doing so sacrifices only about 1 dB in SINR over 80% of the time.