ARPANSA - Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency

All measurements collected in this survey are well below the limits defined by the current ARPANSA Standard RPS3.

The largest extrapolated RF EME level was found at Bulleen East where 1.33% of the general public exposure limit defined by RPS3 was recorded. This value is approximately 75 times less than the permitted exposure level under the current standard.

The largest measured levels of RF EME were found for the South Coogee site where a value of 0.27% of the general public exposure limit defined by RPS3 was measured (around 370 times below the limit defined by the standard). This site also had the largest predicted RF level from the environmental EME report (at 2% of RPS3).

The graphs in the following figures compare the observed and predicted RF EME levels as a percentage of the general public limit of the ARPANSA Standard RPS3.

There is one site for which the highest measured RF level exceeded the extrapolated maximum value. This indicates that there was a significant contribution from other base station antennas in the vicinity. At Beaconsfield there was only one service installed on this base station, but contributions for many other services were detected. At location 1 there were two other services in the UMTS2100 band of roughly equal value to the one being measured.

The antennas at Bulleen East and South Coogee were mounted on building rooftops and were relatively close to the ground in comparison to many of the other sites where the antennas are mounted high up on concrete monopoles or steel lattice towers. This is one reason why the measured values were comparatively larger at these sites.

There are currently three surveyed base stations where the extrapolated maximum RF EME level exceeds the prediction from the environmental EME report: Bulleen East, Palmerston and Lower Sandy Bay. For each of these three sites the UMTS (or WCDMA) pilot signals were not demodulated, rather the extrapolation was done assuming that only the pilot signal was present.

The other sites where the UMTS (or WCDMA) pilot signals were not demodulated were: Bli Bli, Oaklands Park, Rosemeadow, Sandringham and South Coogee. It is therefore not surprising that the sites where the five largest extrapolated RF EME levels were measured (and every site where the RF EME level exceeded 0.5% of RPS3) all fall under this category.

The Bulleen East base station had three UMTS services (3GIS, Optus and Vodafone) and one Telstra WCDMA service present (in addition to some GSM) at the time of the survey. Measurements undertaken by ARPANSA at this site gave an extrapolated maximum of 0.35% of RPS3 when the pilot signal was demodulated. These measurements revealed that the ratio of pilot signal to analogue signal was approximately 27% for each of 3GIS, Telstra and Optus and 42% for Vodafone. This indicates that the results reported by the consultants could have been overestimates by a factor of nearly 4 for each of 3GIS, Telstra and Optus and a factor of 2¹⁄₂ for the Vodafone service.

The Palmerston base station had two Telstra WCDMA channels and one Optus UMTS channel (as well as some GSM) at the time of the survey. The measured signals were dominated by the Telstra WCDMA. The environmental EME report has been revised since the measurements were obtained to a value of 0.52% of RPS3 without the addition of any new services (this is still short of the reported measurement values). Measurements undertaken by ARPANSA at this site gave an extrapolated maximum of 0.33% of RPS3 when the pilot signal was demodulated. These measurements revealed that the ratio of pilot signal to analogue signal was approximately 45%, 18% and 41% for Telstra channel 1, 2 and Optus respectively. Consequently the results reported by the consultants could have been overestimates by a factor of 2, 5 and 2¹⁄₂ for these three channels.

The Lower Sandy Bay base station had only a single Telstra WCDMA channel at the time of the survey. Measurements by ARPANSA at this site gave an extrapolated maximum of 0.11% of RPS3 when the pilot signal was demodulated. These measurements showed that 51% of the analogue signal was due to the pilot signal. The consultant’s results could therefore have been overestimates by a factor of 2.

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