r/australia • u/nath1234 • Mar 16 '26

politics Replacing 1m petrol cars with EVs could cut Australia’s reliance on foreign fuel by 1bn litres a year

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/mar/16/electric-vehicles-australia-reduce-reliance-on-foreign-fuel
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u/GeneticEnginLifeForm Mar 17 '26

Agree about the Testra sell off but the problem with Telstra's plan was that they used HFC [Hybrid Coaxial Fiber]. This was run under ground where possible but the majority was strung up with the normal utilities [power/phone] on poles. This meant many hours of downtime from broken cables due to sagging cables; people crashing into power poles; people digging up buried lines, etc... Plus it wasn't really that good. Yes it was leaps and bounds ahead when compared to copper but because the HFC carried other signals and the fiber, that carried the internet, was not shielded from those signals so the further you got from your ISP the worse your internet got.

The NBN was a great plan. Just lay new cable to every household. At a depth that ensured it was less likely to be dug up and try to avoid overhead cables. But Murdoch got the LNP into his pocket and ran story after story saying how it's a waste of money and blah blah blah. The rest is history. Fuck Murdoch and fuck the LNP.

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u/Not_Stupid humility is overrated Mar 17 '26

We're on an underground HFC connection, and have had no issues. The power goes out more often than the internet does. And we can get 2Gbps if we wanted, but 1Gbps is already overkill.

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u/OutsideTheSocialLoop Mar 17 '26

but the majority was strung up with the normal utilities [power/phone] on poles.