AM radio law opposed by tech and auto industries is close to passing

https://arstechnica.com/cars/2024/05/am-radio-is-a-lifeline-lawmakers-say-tech-and-auto-industries-disagree/

by Bender • 2 years ago

211 335 2 years ago

pajko• 2 years ago

AM transmitters and receivers are a lot easier to make from scratch than FM, and it covers longer distances (mainly due to the lower frequency band). So it's a better fit for emergency and end-of-the-world situations.

Gualdrapo• 2 years ago

My father, who was a farmer, used to carry an AM/FM radio with when he was working. He vehemently forbid us to switch it to FM - batteries lasted longer on AM.

nikau• 2 years ago

Sounds like an excuse he made up to stop you changing the radio station

zamadatix4• 2 years ago

In disaster or end of world situations why do you want your emergency radio to be a car? Likely hard or hazardous to get to to get to, decent probability of not being functional in the situation, and wont have power for long otherwise.

AM is great for emergencies so put a wind up in your emergency kit. If, for some reason, you need to take it to your car then go ahead. Want one at home and one in your car? Go nuts.

shkkmo5• 2 years ago

Conversely, a car is probably the single most important tool most people will own in an emergency situation. It provides a generator, radio and source of heat that can be more easily moved than any alternative. Sure, fuel usage becomes a problem, but a car provides more of a stop gap in emergencies than most alternatives.

I say this as someone who generally dislikes cars and wishes our infrastructure was designed to make them less necessary. They are great in emergencies and decreased car ownership does mean having to make up the slack in emergency preparedness in other areas.

superkuh2• 2 years ago

This is an important law to pass. Not because of it's intended effects but because of the unintended. I strongly support it.

Electrical vehicles' switching power supplies are terrible radiators of low frequency radio. As the articles say, this radio interference is why auto-makers were removing AM radio. If this regulation passes to law it will have the unintended effect of making auto makers not pollute the entire world's shared radio spectrum and prevent it's use by all. The FCC should have stepped in to bar production of many of these vehicles but I guess congress has it accidentally covered. We can only hope that other nations pass similar legislation.

It is entirely possible to minimize and mitigate these conducted and radiated emissions. It will just mean hiring RF/Power EEs to know where to put the caps, how to run a controlled impedance line, etc.

erellsworth• 2 years ago

I wouldn't get your hopes up. Depending on how the final bill is written, simply equipping the vehicle with an AM radio might be enough to satisfy the regulation, even if the reception is so poor as to make it almost unusable.

toomuchtodo• 2 years ago

Software defined malicious compliance. “Sure, it can tune to AM. Ticket closed.”

Just keep kicking the can until the last ~4k AM stations in the US close.

lupusreal4• 2 years ago

If the automakers don't care about reception quality, then why oppose this law? Bad reception in their cars will make their cars look bad, if only by a little, which is why they care.

iancmceachern• 2 years ago

It's not about the radio in the car. It's about the required FCC testing, specifically radiated emissions. It's about what spectrums they check new devices at during that testing to be sure they don't interfere. If they stop checking at those frequencies because we stop making AM radios then we have the potential to loose the ability for even pre existing AM radios to work because all kinds of things will be unintentionally broadcasting in those spectrums.

ranger_danger• 2 years ago

You should be a lawyer.

dylan6043• 2 years ago

If the car companies are fighting this in this manner, they must be receiving enough complaints from users with the poor reception issues so that this is the maker's solution.

Ekaros• 2 years ago

Operates only when car is booted in special mode where all other electronics are shutdown.. Seems reasonable and smart solution.

giantg26• 2 years ago

Wouldn't that technically lemon law the vehicle - repeated service for the same non-correctable issue?

itishappy3• 2 years ago

While I agree, this bill doesn't appear to put any pressure on automakers to reduce RFI.

wcfields• 2 years ago

Hey HAMs: You thought the noise floor was bad now, wait a few years when huge RFI vehicles are roaming all over the place.

mlyle3• 2 years ago

It is entirely possible to minimize and mitigate these conducted and radiated emissions.

Reducing EMI down at medium wave from motor drives is really, really hard. Filter networks that keep most of the switching frequency out of the motor and motor wiring are big, cost money, and reduce efficiency.

dylan6043• 2 years ago

so instead of making the silent electric cars make some sort of noise for pedestrians to hear, they should all just carry a device susceptible to the EMI an EV generates to allow for proximity awareness of a silent EV approaching. /s

I know nothing about the technicalities of why this specific EMI is hard to eliminate, so I'm asking an honest question. Why? What makes it difficult to block this EMI? Where is it being generated (I'm assuming the motor windings??)? Is there not some sort of cage that can be built around the motors by lining the wheel wells to block the EMI?

wvenable• 2 years ago

The law says they need AM radio -- it doesn't say it needs to be good.

KerrAvon• 2 years ago

If RFI interference is the actual problem, this is a terrible bill because it does nothing to limit that. Regulate for the actual problem; unintended consequences will always have other unintended consequences.

remorses• 2 years ago

If only there was a way to make radio signal clear even with background noise. Maybe one day someone will invent frequency modulation instead of this stupid AM thing

itishappy3• 2 years ago

AM radio does still have one big thing going for it: It works when cell service doesn't, such as in the deep woods or during a cell service blackout.

On the other hand, as I don't keep a radio in my house, I guess we're all expected to go turn on the radio in our cars if cell service drops? I'm not sure that'll be a response many people think of...

I'm not sure that's an argument against an AM emergency broadcast system, but I'm also not sure if cars are really the place to mandate them. I wonder if there's regulations requiring government organizations (post offices, libraries, and/or police stations) to keep AM receivers on-hand?

superkuh2• 2 years ago

Even if commercial/government AM radio did not matter at all this would still be a huge problem because innumerable other vital and not so vital things use the shortwave radio bands. Interfering in this is against the law already. Many of these vehicles should not be allowed to be sold commercially according to current unenforced FCC regulations.

itishappy3• 2 years ago

Totally agree! That's unfortunately not what's being regulated here...

UncleEntity• 2 years ago

I guess we're all expected to go turn on the radio in our cars if cell service drops?

That would be the first thing I would do if the power/cell service was out and the emergency sirens were going for a while.

Not too sure I agree with a mandate to require a radio to be installed in every new vehicle as there are a few reasons I can imagine someone would order a car/truck without one. Maybe they intend to immediately replace the factory system with a full on custom block thumper or a company doesn't want their employees to get any funny ideas by listening to NPR or something.

ghaff2• 2 years ago

I’m not sure I’d know how to listen to AM radio over the air. Don’t think my Honda has one. Don’t know about my stereo receiver. Think I have a many decades old transistor radio in th house somewhere because I ran across it a few years back.

LeoPanthera• 2 years ago

On the other hand, as I don't keep a radio in my house

AM radios are about $10 new, and probably considerably less at your local equivalent of Goodwill. Having one seems like a very cheap and very simple disaster preparedness measure.

kragen8• 2 years ago

i'm sure they don't cost anywhere near that much, here's one for 7 dollars new even here in argentina found immediately upon searching https://www.mercadolibre.com.ar/radio-portatil-am-fm-parlant...

with some effort you can probably find one under a dollar new

wishfish2• 2 years ago

Here's an AM/FM/Shortwave for $10 [1]. This is not an endorsement as I haven't used this model. I personally have a Tecsun radio bought for around $30 that does a great job. Will be useful in an emergency. And about once a year, I play the game of "what's the farthest AM station I can receive?" Kinda fun.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Portable-Shortwave-Operated-Reception...

JKCalhoun• 2 years ago

On a lark I ordered a weather radio from Amazon a little while back. Since I live in the storm-infested Midwaste, I thought it was a good idea.

It arrived, I plugged it in, and somewhat familiarized myself with how it worked.

And then two days later it was lit up, blaring as a tornado was making kindling of homes about a mile from where I live (West Omaha, Nebraska).

While the cell phone also kicked off, I like the redundancy and non-reliance on cell.

(Apparently the sound of the tornado warning is already imprinted in the mind of one of my cats. While I was watching tornado videos on YouTube, she crawled under the couch when she heard the familiar sound coming from my laptop.)

wishfish2• 2 years ago

I'd argue this is an essential purchase if you live in storm country. The loud "beep beep beep" of the weather radio has become part of the usual sounds of spring for me.

Glad you made it out of the tornado intact. I'm in Kansas and I really dislike this time of year.

DerekL• 2 years ago

The title is misspelled, should be “AM”, not “Am”.

sp332• 2 years ago

HN automatically title-cases everything. After sumbission, OP can edit the title and changes will stick. This also happens with leading numbers.

abeppu2• 2 years ago

"Requiring the installation of analog AM radios in automobiles is an unnecessary action that would impact EV range, efficiency and affordability at a critical moment of accelerating adoption," said Albert Gore, executive director of ZETA, a clean vehicle advocacy group that opposes the AM radio requirement.

Um, what? I'm not an electrical or automotive engineer, but this doesn't sound true. AM radios can be small, light and cheap, and in terms of power, the important components are already in the sound system, right? IDK what would need to be involved to address the issue of interference from the motor, but I also don't think anyone's saying they have to build anything heavy or power-hungry.

Animats• 2 years ago

"Impact EV range"? When off? Come on.

Now, running Unreal Engine in the dashboard actually does affect vehicle range. Some infotainment systems are real power hogs.

The great thing about AM radio is that it can receive even if all other infrastructure for hundreds of miles around is down. It's not that you get your initial alert over AM radio. It's that you turn it on after the disaster and get some useful info.

abeppu2• 2 years ago

The only way I can imagine this plausibly impacting vehicle range would be if the only solution to protecting the radio from interference from the motor involved a bunch of heavy shielding, but I'm hoping no one's actively considering that.

dylan6043• 2 years ago

said Albert Gore

man, if that was my name, I would demand my name to always be printed as Al Gore. Imagine the disappointment people would have when I turned up instead of whatever someone might have thought. That's so me to be the epitome of that disappointment

blendergeek• 2 years ago

According to Politico [0], he is the son of Al Gore, the former Vice President.

[0] https://www.politico.com/newsletters/the-long-game/2023/01/1...

lukeschlather• 2 years ago

I think the biggest thing with this is reliability. I've got a half a dozen cellular radios lying around my house (cellphones) of which exactly one is functional. Even if I paid for a new sim for the others... I'm not sure some of them could work at all with current transmitters, even if the hardware was functional.

I've got an AM/FM radio that's 20-30 years old and it still works. At some point it would be nice if we could get back to vendor-agnostic wireless protocols that aren't obsolete every 10 years. Until we have such a thing deprecating AM seems premature.

doug_durham• 2 years ago

Cellular protocols are vendor agnostic. It's just that we keep finding ways to eek more bandwidth out of the spectrum. No one wants 3G or the original CDMA.

mindslight2• 2 years ago

Personally I was content with 3G, especially 3G voice that was part of 4G LTE until the US carriers were allowed to kill it and force everyone into churning devices. I would likely still be using my S7 if not for that.

no_wizard2• 2 years ago

Indeed the technology itself is, but the spectrum is not, it’s allocated by FCC auction and effectively controlled by the cellar companies.

This is what I think may be the source of confusion, since you can’t say, build your own cellar device and tap into Verizon’s network without their authorization, like you can with AM or FM radio waves

ryanianian• 2 years ago

TFA mentions AM causing interference in EVs. More accurately, it's hard to isolate an AM antenna from a transformer system. AM reception in EVs is a feat of engineering. FM and others still require care but are comparatively easier.

AM is unique in its propagation. It can travel very far very easily and even bounce off the ionosphere in "shortwave" AM situations. It's hard to imagine any form of broadcast radio beating AM at its own game here.

Satellite radio could work, but satellites are a lot more expensive than a radio tower.

gnicholas• 2 years ago

Would it suffice to require either AM or satellite radio? We never buy satellite radio subscriptions, but our decade old car has an antenna, and I assume many newer cars do as well. As long as people know how to use them to tune into emergency channels (I don’t!), it might suffice for EVs.

gugagore• 2 years ago

Maybe someone can explain why the modulation scheme matters, instead of the frequency range. AM less sensitive to phase noise? Or is it that AM radio typically means some frequency range?

ummonk• 2 years ago

It’s not AM causing interference in EVs. It’s EVs causing interference in their AM radios.

hilbert4218• 2 years ago

"AM reception in EVs is a feat of engineering."

Why? It not ought to be if you know what you are doing!

It seems a great shame that universities don't teach electromagnetic shielding and screening in digital electronics, or if they do they only gloss over it. Once it was a core subject and everyone understood its importance. Moreover, the failure to teach EMR shielding techniques in 101 electrical engineering has been an ongoing saga for decades, it's why digital people end up with little or no concept of the issues that confront engineering in the small-signal analog world.

This lack of training and the failure to emphasize the importance of proper spectrum management, which, in short, is the science of using RF frequencies efficiently without causing interference, is the principal reason why digital people don't seem to give a damn about the RF/EMR pollution and noise emitted from their switching circuits. Now opportunistic EV manufactures have the damned hide to try to sweep away the last vestiges of prudent spectrum management.

Fact: if you cannot listen to a normal broadcast AM radio transmission within its authorized service area on a car radio then the EV's electronics is polluting and radiating noise beyond normal acceptable limits. QED.

One sees crappy almost non-existent shielding everywhere from domestic electronics through to huge Tesla coils that completely block out swathes of radio spectrum for many tens of kilometres. Under ITU and national spectrum management laws such behavior is supposed to unlawful but no one including the FCC does anything of consequence about it (once if you emitted radio noise you'd soon find radio inspectors clambering all over your equipment with RF noise detectors).

Over the past 40 or so years the electromagnetic spectrum, especially HF frequencies, has, in parts, become almost unworkable because of crappy noise from digital electronics and the principal polluters are those in the digital electronics world. Let's be clear what we are talking about here: they are polluters and it's pollution like any other green issue—think of oil spills, chemical residues, nuclear waste, now add to that list electromagnetic pollution.

About 20 years back NATO did a report that indicated the background noise floor on the HF spectrum had been raised by about 6 to 8dB because of unwanted electrical noise. Several years back at a SMPTE engineering exhibition I quoted this figure to the chief engineer of a manufacturer of HF transmitters and he looked at me with surprise and asked where had I been in recent years, he then informed me that the then current noise figure had risen to about 17dB!

That level of EMR pollution is outrageous, it's clear that parts of the RF electromagnetic spectrum are already unusable.

Imagine how bad the EMR pollination will be if these bastard EV manufactures get their way and when there are millions of EVs on the road without adequate EMR suppression. Not only will all long wave, AM and HF bands be unusable but so too will large sections of the VHF band.

For those who don't understand the problem let me put it into perspective. These EMR shielding problems were solved in the 1930s when aircraft used HF radio (≈3-30MHz). Aircraft HF radio receivers have to be about an order of magnitude more sensitive than normal domestic AM radios because the incoming signals are so much weaker. That didn't deter RF engineers of the day, now all aircraft electronics are properly shielded.

So what's wrong with the EV engineers? It seems to me it's a combination of cost-cutting and ignorance.

This law must succeed!

A few basic references for the untrained:

MIT Radiation Laboratory Series vol 23 - Microwave Receivers, Ed: S.N. Van Voorhis, 1948.

Noise Reduction Techniques in Electronic Systems, Ott, Henry. W, 1976, Wiley.

SkyPuncher• 2 years ago

I just have trouble believing that this isn’t a solvable problem. Surely, the type of interference is relatively predictable.

giantrobot3• 2 years ago

At some point it would be nice if we could get back to vendor-agnostic wireless protocols

Cellular, WiFi, and Bluetooth are vendor-agnostic. The issue is there's finite radio bandwidth and because the radios are vendor-agnostic they all need to built to a specification. Interop between cellular basebands made by a variety of players and base stations made by yet more players is already a minor technological miracle.

Old AMPS phones want to use the bands carriers moved to 4G/5G service. There's no affordance for backwards compatibility because the old technology was just shittier. The bandwidth of a single AMPS phone can now carry many dozens of 5G connections and provide them with full service.

TeMPOraL3• 2 years ago

Like with the Internet being "decentralized", the lower-level parts may be vendor-agnostic, but they're not the parts that matter. Being able to build devices talking over cellular protocols does little for me if I'm not able to actually use them with a cellular network.

ProllyInfamous• 2 years ago

The thing I hate most about my Camry Hybrid is that it doesn't have a CD player... but if I wanted one [just like an AM radio] I'd pay to have a new radio unit installed.

For now I'm enjoying the free satelite radio trial.

rpcope12• 2 years ago

One of the most aggravating and rather stupid things in my opinion about newer cars, is if you wanted to install a different or new head unit, it has gotten way more complex. I really miss just being able to buy a regular single-DIN or double-DIN radio and with a small amount of work being able to install it. I wish to god manufacturers would stop trying to integrate everything into the console, and have a standard head unit format, so that I could have more easy choice as to what goes in there, especially as the car ages.

api• 2 years ago

AM radios from 100 years ago will work.

walterbell6• 2 years ago

Yesterday, Senator Edward Markey (D-Mass) revealed that the "AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act" now has the support of 60 US Senators, as well as 246 co-sponsors in the House of Representatives, making its passage an almost sure thing. Should that happen, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration would be required to ensure that all new cars sold in the US had AM radios at no extra cost.

Wow, which lobbyists convinced a critical mass of legislators to support a mature, resilient, democratic information delivery platform with content funded by non-invasive advertising, for the benefit of a non-subscribing public?

AnarchismIsCool• 2 years ago

Yeah that's the part I find extremely odd, why the fuck are they all so eager to support AM radio when they can't agree on literally anything else. Usually you have to follow the money but this kinda flies in the face of that unless there's some wacky industry shit I don't know about.

walterbell6• 2 years ago

If this were a Mad Max movie (#4 opening soon), viewers might speculate about storylines for non-AM comms.

thsksbd9• 2 years ago

Supporting this costs senators nothing but is a nice thing to showcase rural constituencies and those living in areas at high risk of natural disasters.

dghlsakjg4• 2 years ago

Have you listened to AM radio recently?!

If you want to hear the most unhinged broadcasts possible, that’s where you go.

teeray• 2 years ago

No, that distinction belongs solely to CB during good propagation.

Der_Einzige2• 2 years ago

There’s those pirate broadcasts which are somehow tolerated where the real crazies go.

walterbell6• 2 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon's_law

  Sturgeon's law.. is an adage stating "ninety percent of everything is crap". It was coined by Theodore Sturgeon, an American science fiction author and critic, and was inspired by his observation that, while science fiction was often derided for its low quality by critics, most work in other fields was low-quality too, and so science fiction was no different. Sturgeon deemed Sturgeon's law to mean "nothing is always absolutely so".

snakeyjake• 2 years ago

This is the dumbest goddamned bill to ever exist and it dismays me to see everyone cheering on the iHeartmedia and Audacy bribery.

The cover story is that these stations are needed in cases of emergency. If that was actually what was going on congress would allocate funding to distribute portable AM radios to citizens-- radios that can be used when your car is destroyed or inaccessible like it will be in a hurricane, flood, or blizzard. If you even have a car.

CivBase2• 2 years ago

Do you have any idea how much it would cost for the government to distribute portable AM radios to everyone? This law is way less expensive and it's good enough for most use cases.

Der_Einzige2• 2 years ago

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volksempf%C3%A4nger

Hitler basically sort of did this and it was wildly successful for them.

massysett• 2 years ago

My guess: probably about what it cost to distribute Covid tests, but how much that was I don’t know.

thsksbd9• 2 years ago

20 years ago everyone had very many AM radios (car, kitchen radio, alarm clocks, etc). Even today the vast majority of households have at least one AM radio in their car.

The best part is that the poorer you are, the more likely you are to have an AM radio. The only people congress would need to subsidize AM radios for are upper middle class laptop warriors.

msla6• 2 years ago

The problem is that radio stations typically don't have anyone in the booth most of the time, if ever:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minot_train_derailment

The Minot train derailment occurred just west of Minot, North Dakota, United States, on January 18, 2002, when a Canadian Pacific Railway freight train derailed, spreading ammonia gas across the city, delaying rescue operations. The cause was found to be small fatigue cracks in the rails and joint bars, not detectable by the inspection routines then enforced by Canadian Pacific.

[snip]

Because it was the middle of the night, there were few people at local radio stations, all operated by Clear Channel with mostly automated programming. No formal emergency warnings were issued for several hours while Minot officials located station managers at home. North Dakota's public radio network, Prairie Public Broadcasting, was notified and did broadcast warnings to citizens.

And Minot is one of the bigger cities in North Dakota.

hnburnsy• 2 years ago

This feels like the saving of Saturday mail delivery, ugh.

w10-1• 2 years ago

It may be politics.

90% of AM radio stations are owned by ~5 companies pushing a conservative agenda, with a similar disparity in programming (i.e., 90% conservative).

Most of the 10% of non-conservative stations are in progressive markets, where they have little impact. E.g., in San Francisco, the programming split is ~70/30% conservative/liberal.

Here's the (admittedly biased) source, but the numbers would be easily rebutted if untrue:

https://www.americanprogress.org/article/talk-radio-by-the-n...

AM radio licenses are a fixed government monopoly, and it's well within the budget of political organizations to subsidize a radio station, so there will be no change in this disparity driven by market solutions.

Assuming the numbers are true, once government policy results in an enduring political bias in media, does the government have any responsibility to mitigate that bias?

Does the government have any obligation or even mandate to reach into product design and require certain features - features unrelated to safety, pollution, energy, or any other generally accepted social good?

eropple• 2 years ago

Maybe by the manufacturers, but I doubt it; see Musk's pivot to conservative pantomime since acquiring Twitter.

And Ed Markey is not exactly a conservative politician.

rpcope12• 2 years ago

It would be really nice if the FCC hadn't actively tried to kill low power FM and had promoted more low power AM, in conjunction with the FTC or whomever breaking up the big broadcast monopolies. I think mandating AM receivers should come with a push to significantly democratize parts of the bands so that there's more than just the same old stuff across every frequency.

eru• 2 years ago

They should auction off the frequencies, and let the winner use them however they see fit. Instead of holding beauty contests.

(Especially, the winner should be allowed to run eg better wifi on them, or better mobile phone data.)

trimethylpurine6• 2 years ago

90% of AM radio stations are owned by ~5 companies pushing a conservative agenda

This is a bipartisan bill protecting the government's ability to transmit emergency notices on what is inarguably the best available technology to do it.

Saving lives takes precedence over your political identity, I hope. Thankfully both sides of the Senate think so.

I'm glad you weren't involved in their decision. You seem to have lost sight of what's important.

unethical_ban3• 2 years ago

This is a place for discussion, so have a little grace, eh? It's fair to ask "Why not use NOAA radio" or "Doesn't the Emergency Alert System still work".

hvac• 2 years ago

Let’s duplicate the weather radio broadcasts on the AM bands and leave the commercial stuff on the internet/podcasts in order to maximize safety, then. I’m sure the folks lobbying for this bill like the Salem Media Group wouldn’t mind.

Turing_Machine• 2 years ago

From reading the summary it appears that an SDR would be compliant, plus it wouldopen up the possibility of listening to many other things besides (for one, you wouldn't need a separate FM radio. For another, it could also receive weather data).

They're pretty cheap nowadays even for one-off consumer purchases. I imagine the cost would be minimal on an automaker's scale.

redserk• 2 years ago

Why focus on AM when we already have a federally run national emergency broadcast service — the NOAA Weather Radio. Go peruse around 162Mhz. You may find you're within 2-3 different transmitters right now.

Bonus: Zero political anything to worry about. The weather radio is a completely boring readout of the weather and alerts. It’s simple. It’s beautiful.

It would be trivial to support with most existing FM antennas anyways, it already supports national emergency announcements in addition to weather alerts. It even broadcasts a signal telling you where a given alert is targeting. A vehicle could use and correlate its GPS location to notify occupants.

AM would require manually switching the radio mode, tuning to find an appropriate channel, and there’s so much crap to dig around.

Plus, say a nuclear weapon went off anyways and all the FM transmitters died. Is anyone seriously thinking a lone AM transmitter 2000 miles away is going to help? We had all the communication in the world during COVID and that did nothing to stop people from acting foolish.

galleywest200• 2 years ago

Where I live we have signs up all over the place near the mountains that tell you to tune into a specific AM station when flashing for avalanche/weather information. I understand wanting to move past some technologies but we are not going to be able to revamp our entire avalanche system _tomorrow_.

Most people I know do not have a short-wave radio, let alone one capable of receiving at 162Mhz.

tomjen3• 2 years ago

Why not broadcast it as FM? Much better signal, much less chance that somebody misses a word because AM quality is shit.

ac29• 2 years ago

162MHz is VHF, shortwave is much lower frequency (and longer wave).

More or less all US car owners already own a VHF radio. Extending it from 88-108MHz up to 162MHz would be fairly trivial.

gopher_space3• 2 years ago

Where I live we have signs up all over the place near the mountains that tell you to tune into a specific AM station when flashing for avalanche/weather information.

I live in an area like that as well, and the station broadcasts the same info you see on road signs and web sites. If the lights are flashing it's usually playing "snow tires advised for vehicles..." on loop.

the kind of situations people describe where car AM radio is essential feel like corner cases that involve lack of planning and poor judgment or really bad luck. No cell service, no portable radio in your travel kit, no way to stop and ask anyone, and you can't just turn around when you see a flashing sign? It sounds like the plot of a horror movie.

cloudwalk92• 2 years ago

Personal anecdote: that actually saved an important doctor appointment. "URGENT MESSAGE WHEN FLASHING". Well, lights were flashing, guess we could tune to it and hear what it has to say. Sure enough, it announced a traffic jam on our route a few miles ahead that Google Maps vastly underestimated (usually it's been good about that) and we were able to avoid it. Thanks TNDOT.

It was because a chemical truck crashed apparently, on our drive back home it was still there with specialized hazmat emergency vehicles around.

eganist• 2 years ago

Plus, say a nuclear weapon went off anyways and all the FM transmitters died. Is anyone seriously thinking a lone AM transmitter 2000 miles away is going to help? We had all the communication in the world during COVID and that did nothing to stop people from acting foolish.

This is an interesting assertion. Many, many people acted responsibly during the pandemic, and in a worst case scenario such as what you described, it's even more likely that a sizable population will gravitate to any source of reliable information.

The government is usually the source of last resort for many, many things. Whether it's as a lender (e.g bailouts) or as a source of information (emergency broadcasts), it's at the scope of the nation state where extreme contingencies exist and must be accounted for. I imagine AM radio is perfect for this precisely for worst-cases, e.g where someone might seek to make a crystal radio, but I'd be out of my depth thinking beyond this.

I actually was neutral on this until I read your comment and thought it through far enough to reply, so thanks for that.

eimrine• 2 years ago

We had all the communication in the world during COVID and that did nothing to stop people from acting foolish.

The government has took away our (the taxpayers) right to move for the sake of some taxpayer's life. How on Earth is possible for the taxpayer to act foolishly? It is his life, if he considers a death as not that important thing to cancel some party, whether it can be considered as foolish? My opinion is that a human has to have a right to get dead, no matter how much taxes the government is going to not take.

nextaccountic• 2 years ago

Plus, say a nuclear weapon went off anyways and all the FM transmitters died. Is anyone seriously thinking a lone AM transmitter 2000 miles away is going to help?

AM radio is simple enough to build with makeshift materials (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxhole_radio). You don't need batteries or even a power source at all! (the radio waves themselves can bring power)

If civilization had a catastrophic event, I would guess that AM radios would be one of the few surviving technologies

SiVal• 2 years ago

I would love to see kids given the materials and taught how to build makeshift emergency radios in science class every couple of years. Then they could take them home, stick them in a closet or drawer somewhere, and in case of emergency, they would be everywhere.

squigz2• 2 years ago

Every once in a while I'm struck by how magical some of our technology seems...

hilbert4218• 2 years ago

"Is anyone seriously thinking a lone AM transmitter 2000 miles away is going to help?"

It's not for me to explain why in detail here but AM radio communications is the best value for money of any communications system outside of telegraphy (wired or wireless). It's cheap, simple, easy to construct, and it's scalable to any size (and transmission distance) that's needed.

AM radio is one of the greatest inventions of the 20th Century and it's far from outdated.

Come the Bomb and or next war and if you have any communications at all then it will almost certainly be AM Radio.

AM Radio can be local or long distance and cover the world depending on frequency. Years ago during a sunspot maxima, I watched a friend of mine located in NSW Australia talk to someone in California on 27MHz AM using only three watts of power (from a handheld CB radio) and using only a whip antenna.

I defy you or anyone to come up with a simper technology that can do that. If you want to cover say the continental US with radio during, say, a national emergency when nothing else works then it'll be AM radio that comes to the rescue. This simply is why AM radios ought to be made mandatory in every vehicle.

This is not even an argument, it's a no-brainer.

ben_w2• 2 years ago

Years ago during a sunspot maxima, I watched a friend of mine located in NSW Australia talk to someone in California on 27MHz AM using only three watts of power (from a handheld CB radio) and using only a whip antenna.

This example makes me think that these wavelengths will be heavily congested in the event of a major global, or even local, disaster.

redox99• 2 years ago

AM is awful and outdated. The only benefits it currently has, aren't actually related to the amplitude modulation, but simply a property of the reserved frequency bands it uses.

jdietrich3• 2 years ago

This is factually incorrect, because AM is incredibly inefficient. AM receivers can be electrically simple, but unless they are well designed and have very large and well-sited antennas, they have extremely poor practical sensitivity. Most clear channel AM broadcasters in the US operate at 50kW during the day; some international broadcasters operate at hundreds of kilowatts. AM broadcast transmitters are large and vulnerable pieces of infrastructure with little or no redundancy that require colossal amounts of power to operate effectively.

The amateur radio operators who are preparing to maintain communications "come the bomb" are moving in droves to modern digital modes, because of the huge advantages in weak signal performance - likewise for military and public safety radio. If you want to get a message through in tough conditions, it's a no-brainer to use a highly efficient modulation scheme with error correction.

AM receivers are widely available for legacy reasons, but that's about the only thing in AM's favour.

https://wsjt.sourceforge.io/wsjtx.html

https://meshtastic.org/docs/introduction/

greenish_shores2• 2 years ago

Mind the difference between AM and SSB (which may be considered a subset of AM). The efficiency increases with SSB, when compared to usual AM.

msla6• 2 years ago

The problem is that radio stations typically don't have anyone in the booth most of the time, if ever:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minot_train_derailment

The Minot train derailment occurred just west of Minot, North Dakota, United States, on January 18, 2002, when a Canadian Pacific Railway freight train derailed, spreading ammonia gas across the city, delaying rescue operations. The cause was found to be small fatigue cracks in the rails and joint bars, not detectable by the inspection routines then enforced by Canadian Pacific.

[snip]

Because it was the middle of the night, there were few people at local radio stations, all operated by Clear Channel with mostly automated programming. No formal emergency warnings were issued for several hours while Minot officials located station managers at home. North Dakota's public radio network, Prairie Public Broadcasting, was notified and did broadcast warnings to citizens.

And Minot is one of the bigger cities in North Dakota.

Zak2• 2 years ago

You've made a very solid case for AM radio continuing to be a relevant technology today and far into the future.

I do not, however find that to be a compelling argument for mandating its inclusion in cars. While market forces may be inadequate for driving crash safety, emissions, or fuel economy standards, they seem very well-suited to determining whether cars include AM radios. I suspect the answer will be that most car buyers don't care, and a cheap portable receiver is an adequate solution for many who do.

nemo44x2• 2 years ago

My internet was out recently and I realized I don’t even have a radio (or TV antenna) in my house. Just cut off from the world when the internet is failing.

I went out and bought a radio in case that awful day comes.

linsomniac• 2 years ago

If we're going to talk about emergency communications, let's go full send. "Come the bomb", I'm thinking I'm going to want short wave, 10M (citizens band), FRS. Rather than relying on a few huge transmitters, I'm imagining we'll want to make use of the ham radio equipment that is distributed around the world.

Honestly, in my 35+ years of driving, I've used CB/FRS way more often than AM.

mtreis86• 2 years ago

One big problem with FM is that it is selective. If you have two different signals of similar strength on the same frequency you won't get good reception from either. With AM you'd hear both. If one signal is slightly stronger on FM that's the one you'll hear, with AM you'd hear both. For music this is an obvious choice, better to pick a signal than have them interfere, but for emergency communication the opposite is true. It is easy enough for a human to hear two conversations and pick the one you want to listen to by focusing on it - we do this in crowded rooms all the time.

idatum• 2 years ago

I believe this is why aircraft use AM?

K0balt2• 2 years ago

NWR depends on thousands of transmitters providing spotty coverage for most of the landmass of the USA. There are large unserved areas, but few people live in those areas.

The main problem is that this requires that thousands of radio stations continue to operate, where a single AM station can provide service to multiple metro regions and in many cases cover an entire state.

It would be even better if car radios were required to include shortwave / SSB receivers, but there is little mechanism to support the economic ecosystem that would keep those stations viable, and the radios are necessarily more expensive. The long range of shortwave would also open up US listening populations to potential foreign adversaries.

AM is a good compromise. AM recovers are cheap and simple, transmitters can be made using 1920s tech, and A single AM broadcast station can have ranges of nearly 1000 miles, sometimes more.

RF_Enthusiast• 2 years ago

I completely agree about the value of NOAA Weather Radio.

On a related note, the Federal government has primary rights to 1710 KHz, but it's rarely used, and available on most radios. I think three or four high power 1710 stations, synchronized in the decentralized way that WWVH and WWVB are, would be an excellent use of a narrow slice of spectrum, particularly as a way to disseminate information after sunset.

labbett• 2 years ago

AM radio over IP (AMoIP)

userbinator2• 2 years ago

I'm in the tech industry and I support this.

You can receive AM with very simple receivers. The cost of adding one to a car is miniscule, and it works when other more complex systems don't.

Not only emergency broadcasts but things like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travelers%27_information_stati... make it important to have a working AM radio in your car.

dreamcompiler• 2 years ago

AM receivers can be so simple they don't even require a battery.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crystal_radio

speedylight• 2 years ago

I’ve heard that some people with amalgam tooth filling can sometimes pick up transmissions and somehow audio would actually play inside their mouth, not static noise, actual voices talking. It’s quite bizarre but also makes total sense when you think about it!

yau8edq12i4• 2 years ago

I'm sorry but this anecdote sets off my BS detector very hard.

whimsicalism2• 2 years ago

You sound a bit credulous :)

fifteen1506• 2 years ago

Unknown to me if that's real, but you can hear AM radio with a sausage of you're next to the transmitter's antenna: https://youtu.be/GgDxXDV4_hc

bardan• 2 years ago

In this video they can apparently hear the transmission by holding a blade of grass against the transmitter https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9UO9tn4MpI

The video looks convincing but it could also be faked, and I don't think it's possible. The signal coming into the radio tower (which is basically just a big antenna) would already be modulated to a much higher frequency (702khz or whatever).

I guess there could be some other effect that makes it audible when you hold a blade of grass or a hotdog to the transmitter, but I don't think it would be intuitive.

ethagnawl3• 2 years ago

It sounds like it's still on open question as to whether or not this is possible.

This story was the one that came to mind when I say your comment and the post makes for a quick, interesting read.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/lucille-ball-fillings-spie...

m463• 2 years ago

Right, "opposed by tech industry" is very broad and all tech doesn't think that.

It's sort of like clickbaiting doctors when they read "doctors don't know what causes obesity!".

bo1024• 2 years ago

I thought the argument was that adding functional AM receivers to EVs is difficult?

1970-01-013• 2 years ago

It is. Commenters are not reading the article.

msla6• 2 years ago

The problem is that radio stations typically don't have anyone in the booth most of the time, if ever:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minot_train_derailment

The Minot train derailment occurred just west of Minot, North Dakota, United States, on January 18, 2002, when a Canadian Pacific Railway freight train derailed, spreading ammonia gas across the city, delaying rescue operations. The cause was found to be small fatigue cracks in the rails and joint bars, not detectable by the inspection routines then enforced by Canadian Pacific.

[snip]

Because it was the middle of the night, there were few people at local radio stations, all operated by Clear Channel with mostly automated programming. No formal emergency warnings were issued for several hours while Minot officials located station managers at home. North Dakota's public radio network, Prairie Public Broadcasting, was notified and did broadcast warnings to citizens.

And Minot is one of the bigger cities in North Dakota.

1970-01-013• 2 years ago

The cost of adding one to a car is miniscule.

[citation needed]

There's a Grand Canyon between putting in an AM radio circuit and putting in a fully functional AM radio, doing over the vehicle's EMF, and then making it last for a vehicle's lifetime.

anthk• 2 years ago

The 70/80's (can't remember) pocket transistor radio from my dad still works.

lolinder2• 2 years ago

All I'm seeing is two opposing assertions, neither of which provides a citation. Why should I trust you over OP?

bdcravens• 2 years ago

My grandfather, about 100 years ago, built one with copper wire, a crystal he was given by his teacher, and a cylindrical oatmeal box.

bitcoin_anon• 2 years ago

If the cost is so minuscule, why not let the market work it out?

Why must all cars have AM radio?

lolinder2• 2 years ago

Because like most safety features, AM radio matters most in rare situations that people don't think about when they're purchasing a vehicle. If we let the market work it out we'll find that we lose access to AM radio because people won't notice until they need to tune in to a traveler information station and can't because their radio doesn't support AM.

Then we'll get a bunch of people who are either ignorant of the conditions or who are fumbling with their phones trying to find the information on the internet somehow.

We could phase in a new traveler information system that works in new cars, but that would require an enormous expenditure of resources to roll out the new system and then we'd have to maintain the old one for as long as there are vehicles on the road that don't support the new. It's far more cost effective to just mandate that all vehicles be able to receive signals from our existing system.

duxup• 2 years ago

A big reason for that is electromagnetic interference from electric motors—rather than risk customer complaints from poor-quality audio, some automakers decided to remove it.

Is this a hard problem to overcome?

CivBase2• 2 years ago

How bad is the interference that it might drive customer complaints about AM audio quality?

roschdal• 2 years ago

America wants AM radio everywhere, Norway wants DAB radio everywhere. Strange.

tempaccount1234• 2 years ago

Because it’s cheaper to run DAB than FM and running both with the same content costs too much. But for range, DAB is even worse. The neighboring country’s stations here already stop working five miles behind the border. FM covers 50 miles and since local AM transmission have stopped, in my car I can listen to stations 300 miles away. It sounds like crap but it’s still usable and I tune in often. For sports coverage it was good enough and I miss the times where it was possible to listen to full games while driving. The FM replacement doesn’t cover as much area and there’s no consistent internet coverage to listen via app (and it’s illegal to play with your phone while driving, so once the app cuts out, you can’t restart it)

rsynnott• 2 years ago

Ireland had DAB radio mostly everywhere, but turned it off a few years back; back to FM. Analogisation!

bparsons• 2 years ago

In a true emergency situation (like if a big portion of the power grid or internet went down) you need some way to communicate with people. This is a no brainer if you care about public safety.

guenthert• 2 years ago

As others have already stated, the safety aspect is just a red-herring.

Even in 'merica, most people don't quite spend most of their time in the car. And who has an AM radio at home or with them? Like it or not (I don't), but smartphones is the medium to reach the vast majority of people. And if in a disaster cell phone services is interrupted, that will the be first to be restored (before water and power), by temporary means if necessary. E.g. Cisco has an emergency response team with mobile tech.

msla6• 2 years ago

The problem is that radio stations typically don't have anyone in the booth most of the time, if ever:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minot_train_derailment

The Minot train derailment occurred just west of Minot, North Dakota, United States, on January 18, 2002, when a Canadian Pacific Railway freight train derailed, spreading ammonia gas across the city, delaying rescue operations. The cause was found to be small fatigue cracks in the rails and joint bars, not detectable by the inspection routines then enforced by Canadian Pacific.

[snip]

Because it was the middle of the night, there were few people at local radio stations, all operated by Clear Channel with mostly automated programming. No formal emergency warnings were issued for several hours while Minot officials located station managers at home. North Dakota's public radio network, Prairie Public Broadcasting, was notified and did broadcast warnings to citizens.

And Minot is one of the bigger cities in North Dakota.

seydor• 2 years ago

If we want to have our uncensored communication back, we need AM radio

asdefghyk• 2 years ago

Besides the reliability of AM

THe internet network and the mobile phone network has many parts. A breakdown in any of these parts would disrupt/break communications A mobile phone cell (depending on technology) is often only a small size or diameter. A mobile phone base station is reliant on the electricity supply. If the wired electricity supply is down ( during an emergency) the mobile phone base state MAY have batteries that will run it for a while. Where for a while would be measured in hours. During emergencies such as flood or fire such base stations maybe out for many days. Broadcast band AM radio signals , normally 500KHz to 1.6MHz can have a reliable transmission range for typical broadcast transmitter normally several KW power ) of RELIABLE 100 miles during the DAY. AM radio range during night can be 1000s KM. The mobile network is prone to failure during emergencies and is hard to make robust. Opposition to AM network usage for emergencies would be from entities that want a small cost reduction in car manufacture.

ReptileMan• 2 years ago

Requiring the installation of analog AM radios in automobiles is an unnecessary action that would impact EV range, efficiency and affordability at a critical moment of accelerating adoption

That is advanced stupid.

walrus01• 2 years ago

People who think that AM radio is useless in the modern era, have clearly never lived in a city with a 50,000 watt AM station that has extremely regular traffic updates. Info on crashes, bridge and tunnel problems, etc reported by a local who knows all of the choke points and common problem areas is very valuable, particularly because you can get it hands-free without needing to look at an app on a phone or on a car screen.

And often more reliable and better than just relying on a navigation app to route you around bad traffic.

In the Pacific Northwest you will also get updates on border traffic between Washington and BC, and also WA and BC ferry information.

amadeuspagel• 2 years ago

A recent test of the emergency alert system found only 1 percent got it via AM.

Only 1%? Surely we can leave 1% of americans behind in an emergency.

Ylpertnodi• 2 years ago

As you have volunteered to be a 1%-er, I salute your sacrifice.

Avamander• 2 years ago

Because other channels worked? We don't know what the percentage would be if it were actually the only option.

rapht• 2 years ago

Preserve AM radio for worst-case scenario emergency, where nothing else ever is available -- that's the million year solar flare or the next nuclear winter -- of course. AM is the best at what it does, which is transmitting efficiently, with low power, including in difficult terrain, all with extremely simple hardware.

But why the heck mandate thay we can receive it in every car?? I mean, cars are important in America, but why would you need the wordt-case scenario emergency thing in every car! Mandate home radio equipment makers to support it, or mandate one receiver in every house à la smoke detectors. Cheap and easy. But every car? Crazy stupid.

valeg• 2 years ago

I wish AM Stereo is back in vogue.

johnklos• 2 years ago

"Requiring the installation of analog AM radios in automobiles is an unnecessary action that would impact EV range, efficiency and affordability"...

I think this bull is them telling on themselves, since the cost of adding an AM radio would be practically unmeasurable compared with the cost of the car. So where would this bill impact EV range, or efficiency, or affordability? The only way this is possible is if the EV makers have to make their cars emit less electromagnetic noise, I'm guessing.

K0balt2• 2 years ago

AM radio is most useful for its resilience in the worst case scenarios and for its reach to underserved populations.

It benefits from comparative simplicity and longer range than FM. It can also be trivially connected to digital modes for even longer ranges and reliable data transmission.

Crude receivers can be made from readily available materials and require no local source of power.

Maintaining a national network of AM broadcasting stations by ensuring economic viability is a low cost method of ensuring communications resiliency for the nation under the worst of circumstances. I can’t say for the difficulty of filtering EMI from EVs, but assuming that a vehicle already will have some kind of audio system, AM radio is a <2$ add to an existing radio receiver.

Think of it as a 2$ per car one time tax to ensure improved worst case CCC capability for the nation in the face of the most acute threats to the population.

cushychicken• 2 years ago

That’s kind of far out that Ed Markey and Ted Cruz are the co sponsors of this bill.

For the record: I love Ed Markey. I’m in his congressional district. (Technically, I’m in his town - his registered congressional address is in Malden, MA!) I’m kind of surprised to see him co sponsor with Ted. But I’m pleased that the two of them are working together.

We need more public examples of this - or more publicity for the examples of this that go down. I’m sure there are lots. They’re just not as cinematic as culture war stories.

throwaway01uau2• 2 years ago

178 comments and nobody mentioned https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Radio_Mondiale !?

It provides high quality digital broadcasts on the same spectrum as AM and with way more power efficiency.

Receivers cost nothing and are immune to EV radio noise.

ugjka• 2 years ago

They have their own thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HD_Radio#HD_versus_DRM

millerm• 2 years ago

Maybe people could learn what a portable transistor radio is. Maybe they could just give you one with your car. Sell one for $2.99. Is a car really your best option to be in in an emergency? Sometimes you need to get out of that car, maybe find shelter. That car radio is not going help you at all while down in a cellar as tornadoes have ripped through and destroyed everything including your car.

gpvos• 2 years ago

Meanwhile in Europe the AM bands have become nearly empty by now.

nemo44x2• 2 years ago

Could they just toss a simple AM radio into the glove box that plugs into a port for power?

pridkett• 2 years ago

Driving home from Burlington, VT after the eclipse. Traffic was crawling. Cell data wasn’t working. FM seemed like all automated stations from far away. Yknow what did provide information on traffic and scaled to the huge influx of people in the area? A news station on AM radio.

But that brings up a bigger problem, many many radio stations are essentially on autopilot or run from a distance without the ability to address local situations. Without support for truly local stations, AM radio may be present, but generally without significant value.

darby_eight• 2 years ago

Also a big fan of AM radio in vermont, but the flipside of this is that it's been used to peddle misinformation for decades.

pizzafeelsright• 2 years ago

There is only information. No dis or mal or contra.

phkahler2• 2 years ago

AM is something I don't normally use, but I depend on in situations like that. It's more reliable than the internet by far too.

ajross2• 2 years ago

It's 100% not more "reliable" than the internet is. AM stations are down regularly, receivers are (c.f. this very article) inconsistently deployed and many users don't know how to use the ones they own.

What you're saying is that it's a useful backup for a service that remains imperfect. But if you had to pick just one emergency notification technology for the modern world, it would be mobile telephones. There's really no significant argument there.

webdoodle• 2 years ago

AM can propagate so much further at night, when the ionosphere isn't causing distortion. I'm not looking for good quality, I'm looking to hear stations further away. I absolutely don't want to have to use internet access as a substitute, where now i have to transmit just to receive.

mmis1000• 2 years ago

I am not sure if it is a country wide thing or not. But in Taiwan. Most emergency radio and music radio including illegal radio sites are in FM instead of AM. (probably due to sound quality) The AM is really obsoleted here. I am surprising there are still a lot of people using am radio. Do people use it for emergency radio only or some other reasons?

shkkmo5• 2 years ago

AM is good for long range coverage and North America has a lot of really empty areas that make this long range more useful than it is in denser areas.

AM stations in the USA carry a variety of content while being a bit heaveir on "talk" stations over music when compared to FM.

BeetleB2• 2 years ago

But in Taiwan. Most emergency radio and music radio including illegal radio sites are in FM instead of AM.

Taiwan is tiny. You need only a few FM towers to cover the whole country.

FM's range is low. AM's range is much, much higher:

"However, during nighttime hours the AM signals can travel over hundreds of miles by reflection from the ionosphere, a phenomenon called "skywave" propagation. (Shortwave stations, which operate using AM modulation on several bands between between 2.3 MHz and 26.1 MHz, also use this phenomenon to broadcast still greater distances, up to thousands of miles.) Because of this change in signal propagation from daytime to nighttime, if every AM station kept its daytime operating power at night, massive interference would result. (For a similar description, see Hours of Daytime-Only AM Broadcast Stations, First Report and Order, BC Docket 82-538, 95 FCC 2d 1032 (1983) [ PDF ] and related [ MO&O ])."

https://www.fcc.gov/media/radio/am-stations-at-night

In the US, it's used for all kinds of stations - mostly junk talk shows and sports. And yes, emergencies. When driving on highways, you'll often see signs with lights telling you to tune into a certain AM frequency if the lights are flashing (e.g. landslide ahead).

oatmeal1• 2 years ago

This article left me with two questions: Why can't FM be used to transmit emergency info? How many people in an emergency are even going to know to turn on AM radio?

mtillman• 2 years ago

I wasn’t aware of this law so it may or may not be a good law. One thing I noticed was the statement that it will be offered at “no extra cost” which is a bizarre thing to say. Can’t a manufacturer of a large thing with many components just slightly increase the cost of each part to cover the cost of the required thing? What fantasy land do people have to live in to think that something will be forced on a company and that company won’t somehow make up the gap somewhere else? It’s not like airbags or rear view cameras are magically free.

jesboat• 2 years ago

It means no extra cost relative to the same car without an AM radio, I think.

ellisd• 2 years ago

The last emergency AM broadcast I recall being relevant to my life in the United States was the 1994 Northridge Earthquake, pre-SMS. All the copper phone lines were overloaded from calls and this was the only medium to receive information.

Our family sat in the minivan in the driveway and tuned to KFWB News 980 AM right as their station returned to air on backup generators.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KFWB

It no longer broadcasts news, but AM station KNX could/would effectively do the same.

squarefoot• 2 years ago

AM frequencies (medium and short waves) with the right propagation and time of the day condition travel well beyond the horizon, following the Earth curvature, without the need for repeaters in the middle. That's how people in non free countries can get news coming from abroad while all their local FM, TV, internet and cellphones are heavily censored. There are some good reasons to keep AM working.

nfriedly• 2 years ago

Requiring the installation of analog AM radios in automobiles is an unnecessary action that would impact EV range, efficiency and affordability...

I find that hard to believe. I understand that EV motors cause interference, but this seems like a solvable problem - and even if not, it could still work when the vehicle is parked.

AM radio law opposed by tech and auto industries is close to passing

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