On: Why are UK electricity bills so expensive?

[RobotToaster]

Maybe, but the long term planning has been atrocious, millions of smart meters already need replacing because of the 3g switch off.

It's massively wasteful if they are all going to need replacing again in 10 years when 4g is switched off.

Not to mention the concerns about electricity companies remotely forcing meters into prepayment mode or switching off people's electricity supply.

[celsoazevedo → RobotToaster]

Planing has been bad, but those smart meters can use 2G/EDGE. The meters using mobile networks use O2, which should keep 2G online until the 2030s.

3G is being discontinued first because it uses more power and is inefficient for data. 2G on the other hand uses less power, allows phones without VoLTE support to make calls, and IoT devices to use (slow) data. Over the next year or so we should see networks restricting data over 2G/EDGE for regular devices (calls only), keeping the data side just for IoT.

[Symbiote → RobotToaster]

Something (2G?) is generally staying available so "smart" devices can work for decades.