S2 smart meters in the Northern Territory using the Arqiva network - why isn't the meter able to connect to the WAN?

Don't forget Arqiva operate all of the UK's 1150 TV transmitters, and 95%+ of all radio transmitters, they're not short of sites that can reach your home! 

I’ve been finding it interesting to learn about the different approaches taken by France and Germany. @bingbongovo2021 would you be able to share the sources you’ve found with more info on this?

Thanks for your patience whilst we confirm some advice on your experience as well. We’ve not forgotten, it’s on my list to check for an update daily and when it arrives, I’ll post it here! :) 

@bingbongovo2021  - here’s the relevant procedure to be followed by OVO in cases where their installer finds that there’s no WAN connection.

The Communications Hub was supplied to OVO by the Data Communications Company (DCC) and remains their property. So @Jess_OVO’s comments above are correct.

I found this interesting post from another forum recently which was a response from a utility supplier regarding the inability of Arqiva to communicate with their SMETS2 meters:

There is an area of the North Yorkshire Moors, which contains the RAF radar base at Fylingdales. This base is part of the Ballistic Missile Early Warning System with its primary purpose to give the British and US governments warning of an impending attack. Your address is located in the RAF Fylingdales region 33km from the Fylingdales boundary.
Arqiva has not declared your address as a working postcode, that is, we cannot provided service currently. The standard Communications Hub which we deploy elsewhere in the country has a radio frequency which would interfere with this sensitive region. To avoid any interference with the radar base we have developed the Dual Band Variant 450 Comms Hub which is currently in development and testing. The testing responsibility currently lies with the Data Communication Company (DCC) the company licensed by the government and regulated by Ofgem to connect smart meters and homes across the country to a single secure, digital network.

I’ve not yet read any official report as to the cause of the Bilsdale transmitter fire which I assume also affected the LRR communication with SMETS2 meters. It wouldn’t be anything to do with RAF Fylingdales would it? I presume the 450 Comms hub was located at Bilsdale whilst under test. Just curious.

Thanks @Cactus - I need to separate out two concepts here.

The Dual Band Communications Hub label refers to the use of two frequencies for the Home Area Network (HAN). The lower 868MHz is an ‘extension’ to the Zigbee protocol and has better penetration of walls.

Dual Band Comms Hubs are required for problematic sites in all three territories of GB. They offer better connection for gas meters and IHDs.

In the Northern Territory, the Wide Area Network operates on the 440MHz band which was originally used by the old ITV analogue service. It actually spans 412-455MHz, but is still regarded as a single band.

The way that Arqiva and EDMI designed the WAN was for the lower frequency of the range, around 412MHz, to be used for transmission from the Comms Hub, whilst 453-455MHz was for receive.

The situation near Fylingdales is complicated by 412MHz interfering with a frequency used by the RAF Monitoring Station. For that reason a new 450 variant is under test which will employ 453-455MHz for both transmit and receive.

That is unrelated to the designation of Dual Band for the Comms Hub.

Arqiva is wanting to withdraw from involvement in the Smart Meter transmission side of its business. They’re currently open to offers.

Thanks for that information Transparent. Interesting to learn that Arqiva is wanting to withdraw from SMETS transmission. I hope the 450 variant passes the trial test so that my SMETS2 meter will no longer be dumb, whilst assuming the interference from RAF Fylingdales is the cause of my non-comms issue.

Not really related, but is this what was once rumoured also to cause the electronics in some modern cars to reset spontaneously, bringing them to a sudden halt?

Or was that an urban myth, or was I an April Fool, or ...

@Cactus  wrote:

assuming the interference from RAF Fylingdales is the cause of my non-comms issue.

Erm… I think Fylingdales is a listening station. They don’t get to choose the frequencies.

Dear President Lou Shenko,

Would you mind awfully if Belarus and its neighbouring ex-Soviet countries shifted your military frequencies down a notch or two?

I’ve had a word with our chaps on the Yorkshire Moors and they think they’ll be able to eavesdrop on you just as easily below 400MHz.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Bit of a delayed response from me but this is a very interesting thread and makes me content that I’ve not yet made my 2nd attempt at getting a smart meter installed (the 1st being blocked by the installer who said he couldn’t do the installation because the current gas meter is sat on a wooden shelf - go figure).

In theory, the answer to all of these communications tech issues is 5G. That will provide a large-scale network capable of scaling to millions of devices within an area and should come in at a lower cost than 4G.

I attended something about 5G a while ago and had my expectations confirmed that practical 5G (beyond the limited mobile phone use currently available) is a couple of years away at the moment and the standards are still evolving. But it should make a big differencefor things like this once it kicks in fully.

The other wireless network that is very rapidly gaining ground is LoRa. The Helium network in particular is a very interesting concept and worth looking at. It is only low bandwidth of course but might be sufficient for smart meters.