What changes next, and what it costs
Technology through the lens of cost: what is being switched off, what replaces it and who pays.
Eight boiler units of about 800 tonnes each will be taken out of the closed Kent nuclear station, clearing roughly a third of its above-ground structures.
The government's summer tracker shows 53% would pick a connected washing machine or dishwasher when replacing one, but fewer than half are comfortable letting a supplier decide when it runs.
A live trial with Nokia at Paddington let one O2 site carry more data on the same spectrum and equipment, which is the most expensive part of running a mobile network.
From December, sensing technology from Lightsonic will listen for leaks along Openreach's full fibre network, without the need for new sensors or digging.
Monthly figures from Building Digital UK show the subsidised broadband build has reached 340,880 rural and hard-to-reach premises, with wide differences between contracts.
The UK's mobile networks have set dates between 2029 and 2030 to retire their 2G services. The phones most people carry will not notice, but a lot of quiet machinery will.
Since January 2025, new phone and broadband contracts cannot tie annual rises to inflation. Here is what the rules require, what changed in 2026, and how to work out what a contract will really cost.
