ARLA/CLUSTER: Bizarro: Luzes para crescimento de marijuana causam interferências ao radioamadores americanos

[João Costa > CT1FBF]

Marijuana grow-lights cause problems for ham-radio operators

The marijuana industry and Uncle Sam haven't been on the same page for
80 years, but these days, in a unique bit of weirdness, it's not the
U.S. Department of Justice that could create a problem for pot
growers: It's the Federal Communications Commission.

The FCC regulates the country's electronic communications, which is
relevant because it turns out that, bizarrely, light ballasts used in
the growing of cannabis emit radio-frequency interference that screws
up amateur-radio transmissions being sent by local ham operators, a
licensed, legally protected practice.

In a March 12 letter to the commission, the American Radio Relay
League, the national association for amateur radio, complained that
interference from grow lights was greatest in the medium- and
high-frequency bands between 1.8 and 30 megahertz, and that it comes
in no small amount.

"The level of conducted emissions from this [Lumatek LK1000 grow
light] is so high that, as a practical matter, one RF ballast operated
in a residential environment would create preclusive interference to
Amateur radio HF communications throughout entire neighborhoods,"
wrote general counsel Christopher Imlay to acting chief of the FCC
Spectrum Enforcement Division John Poutasse in the hopes the agency
would halt sales.

Read the full Colorado Springs Independent article
http://www.csindy.com/coloradosprings/marijuana-grow-lights-cause-problems-for-ham-radio-operators/Content?oid=2893921