NORAD and USNORTHCOM Defense Surveillance Gap Filler Strategy. Wide-area surveillance is a key component of Air Domain Awareness and is critical to air and missile defense of the homeland; however, NORAD and USNORTHCOM lack adequate real-time, persistent, multi-domain surveillance. The NORAD and USNORTHCOM Surveillance Gap Filler Strategy proposes to rectify this problem by providing the Commands with a foundation to develop a family of systems permitting persistent wide-area air and maritime surveillance to enhance defense against threats in the interior of and in the approaches to North America.

The C2 Gap Filler Joint Capability Technology Demonstration will demonstrate a capability that enables efficient, secure, timely and trusted exchange of information resulting in enhanced C2 capabilities for NORAD and USNORTHCOM.

A second effort is the Next Generation Over-the-Horizon Radar (OTHR) Technical Risk Reduction Initiative (TRRI) Phase 1 project. TRRI was developed to minimize the technical risks of building a next generation OTHR prototype while simultaneously raising technical readiness levels of advanced radar technologies. Over-the-horizon radars are proven, wide-area surveillance systems with the ability to detect and track thousands of air and maritime targets at ranges exceeding 1,500 miles from the radar site. When completed, these initiatives will improve wide-area surveillance around North America.

Radar Interference. Comprehensive Air Domain Awareness will not be attained unless we can resolve the growing issue of radar interference. As such, NORAD and USNORTHCOM support the establishment of an interagency process to allow the accurate assessment of existing and future plans for obstructions that potentially disrupt various radars within our area of operations. A formal vetting process is required with the necessary authorities to prevent projects from interfering with the defense of North America, while supporting the expansion of alternative energy sources, such as wind farms. To that end, NORAD has taken the initiative to form a radar obstruction evaluation team to quantify the impacts of proposed wind energy projects in close proximity to our radars.