The present invention is a method and an apparatus to use carrierless signals for energizing remote passive or active transponders (tags) and for communication link between a reader and the transponders. The reader's transceiver generates very short high power pulses to transmit them to the transponder which receives and stores the pulse energy in an energy store on the transponder. At the transponder the power pulse signal is compressed by a matched filter and rectified. Information to be transmitted from the reader to the transponder and from the transponder to the reader can be added to the data pulses by means of pulse position modulation, bi-phase modulation or other well-known wide-band modulation techniques. The communication is active as the transponder utilizes stored power for transmission and reception of signals while the transponder can be passive and is powered by the reader's signal energy.