Norway Planning To Kill Analog FM

On April 16, Norway's Ministry of Culture issued a press release stating it will be the first country to completely digitize radio broadcasting. The country is planning to deactivate all remaining FM stations by the end of 2017--any broadcasting done after this point will use Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) technology. There are numerous benefits to digital-only broadcasting, including space for dozens more channels and DAB's more robust transmitters, which are favorable in emergency conditions and allow tunnel reception. The switch will occur in a regional sequence, beginning with Nordland in January 2017 and concluding with Finnmark in December of that year.

Norway has been discussing a switch-off for years and developed absolute criteria for a 2015 decision to cease analog in 2017. As discussed in the announcement, criteria guaranteed added listener value for digital broadcasts and digital coverage that at least matches that of the largest national radio station, NRK P1.

While this announcement may come as a relative shock, Norway has always been ahead of the times in digital broadcasting. The country started Alltid Klassisk, the first digital radio station in the world to broadcast using DAB, in 1995. Norsk rikskringkasting (NRK), the government-owned broadcasting service that dominates radio, already has 99+% coverage on DAB, with commercial stations broadcasting using DAB over almost 93% of their spectrum. Community-run stations will be probably be the hardest-hit as far as conversion costs, as only 50% of their nationwide coverage is digital.

Most of the transition's burden will fall squarely on the shoulders of listeners for several reasons. First and foremost, analog radios simply can't receive digital signals, so the 44% of Norwegian listeners that only tune in to analog FM will either need a new digital rig or retrofit their old one with a DAB adapter or converter. More significantly, only 20% of private cars in Norway are currently equipped with DAB radio. As evidenced by recent national transitions from analog to digital television, digital and analog signals degrade in different ways. Whereas most analog signals gradually degrade and lose signal quality, digital ones retain perfect signal quality until they suddenly cut out, causing interruptions in the broadcast.

Other countries with a strong digital radio presence are following Norway's lead and establishing their own strict criteria for possible switchovers. Denmark, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, and South Korea all have significant and growing listener bases and may see a switch in the future. The United Kingdom had originally set a switch-off date of 2015 but has struggled to meet criteria that mandates digital radio use by over 50% of total listeners, and the UK's digital listening stats have actually decreased while showing an increase in FM analog listening several times during the last few years. A changeover is highly unlikely in the US due to its much more commercial broadcasting structure (it lacks a dominant public broadcasting company like NRK or the BBC) and lack of support for digital and HD Radio service.

If Norway's radio transition is anything like the digital television transitions that've taken place worldwide, the country will soon be implementing equipment trade-in programs and spending millions if not billions of kroner to raise awareness and spur listener preparedness. The Ministry of Culture is probably wise to spread the transition over the course of 2017 to avoid the hundreds of thousands of daily support calls to the FCC witnessed by the 2009 US digital TV transition. If Norway plans as patiently and carefully as its previous studies on the digital switchover, they can likely expect a smooth, efficient transition with minimal fallout.

Image credit: brankomaster / CC-by-2.0