A number of smart meters communicate over the mains wires, especially when they're in very sparse areas. There was even a thought for a bit to offer internet services over the power distribution cables, but I don't think they ever really got effective data rates high enough to be competitive.

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ComputerGuru 5 days ago | parent | next [-]

Yes, that seems to be what mine is doing as my ecobee thermostat is able to read info about peak usage times from the mains. I didn't know about the latter part though, I never imagined electric companies were making a play for the internet (though it seems like an obvious thought in retrospect).

	▲	esseph 5 days ago \| parent [-]
		A lot of electric companies in the US are also ISPs. They already have most of the equipment to run fiber, and many also do wireless links between substations.

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mdaniel 5 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

And its "last mile" friend of using the in-wall cable as Ethernet drops, too, e.g. https://www.tp-link.com/us/powerline/ (but I don't think it holds a candle to actually pulling cat 5 or 6, for clarity)

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dpb001 5 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

In the early 2000’s there were efforts to provide broadband over power lines (BPL). I think one of the biggest obstacles was the radio frequency interference it generated.

	▲	vel0city 5 days ago \| parent [-]
		Re-reading some of the history of it that does sound like RF interference was more of a concern than data rates. Some places even attempted roll-outs but were stymied by regulators wanting more studies about potential impacts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadband_over_power_lines Thanks for correcting me on that.

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extraduder_ire 5 days ago | parent | prev [-]

If it's low enough bitrate, wouldn't you be able to read that by putting an antenna or loop of wire near the mains? I assume they use a documented standard.