R&d Plan to Support Domestic Radar Network Decisions

This chapter outlines an R&D plan of risk reduction activities to support a decision on how best to meet the Nation's future needs for surveillance radar. After the overview of goals and objectives in section 6.1, sections 6.2 through 6.4 present the three major components of the proposed R&D work: • Technology development and testing; • Proof of MPAR operational concepts; and • Refinement of the MPAR network concept. Section 6.5 summarizes the JAG's estimates of resources and schedule time required to conduct all the proposed activities in these three R&D components. Further details of the resource and schedule estimates are provided in appendix D. The goal of the proposed R&D strategy is to demonstrate that an affordable, high power, multipurpose phased array radar can be developed to provide the revolutionary capabilities described in chapters 3 and 4 of this report. The major objectives to be achieved by the proposed activities are: • Technical risk reduction for the issues discussed in chapter 4; • Establishment of a documented basis for cost comparisons between the MPAR and MRCR alternatives for meeting national domestic radar surveillance needs (building on the preliminary cost factor comparisons presented in chapter 5); and • Formulation of the path forward for required research, development, test, and implementation, if an MPAR option for future surveillance is selected. To the extent possible, the R&D activities should leverage existing capabilities at Federal and university research laboratories and in industry. Ongoing weather radar R&D, specifically using the National Weather Radar Testbed (NWRT) and existing short-wavelength polarimetric radars, can be leveraged to substantial advantage. In the near-term, the NWRT will play a major role in activities such as testing scanning strategies, time management use for tracking aircraft and weather, and specialized signal processing and advances afforded by the agile beam. An X-band polarimetric radar that is already under development will be used to study short-wavelength radar units as potential low-level, short-range radars in a nationwide MPAR network. However, the most important aspects of multiple use coupled with digital beam forming will require developmental