Microwave links: The future for urban rainfall measurement?

Microwave links are ideally suited to the urban environment, since there are many suitable vandal-free locations to which the receiver and transmitter can be attached. A signal sent along a link is received with reduced power as a consequence of scattering and absorption by intervening water droplets. Thus a measurement of the power loss can be transformed into a measure of total path rainfall. This paper discusses the requirements for the estimation process to be accurate. The paper presents results using a single frequency, together with the improved results from a dual-frequency link. Potential future applications of microwave links are presented.