I have just had my electricity meter upgraded so they won’t have to visit it to read it any more and the plan is that I can monitor my electricity use in real time!. This would be like the car displays that tell you your MPG and thus not very useful. They are both things that you can do nothing about.
However, the data transport between the meter and the consumer monitor is bluetooth, a technology with a common range of 10m, or 13 yards or paces. The link also requires a line of sight between the two devices. Someone took this decision, despite the fact that every meter they ever install has a cable running into the delivery site. They could equally have used the phone connection required for remote monitoring and billing.
I should think this choice makes the technology’s use impossible in every block of flats in the country and possibly even in many large houses.
Someone or several people chose to do this!
I have tested the bluetooth connection by with the two devices inches apart. I have an external USB battery and the device itself seems to have a battery. I cannot make a bluetooth connection even at this insistence with no barriers. There must be a different problem.