Elaine Byrne: We abandoned hope of connection, and signed up to satellite instead

Satellite broadband, from a growing number of providers, may be a quicker and better answer to rural Ireland’s offline woes than the National Broadband Plan

Elon Musk’s satellite internet venture Starlink is one of the providers that bypass the need for the NBP in some parts of rural Ireland

Our household in rural Carlow has finally grasped the nettle and placed our trust in Elon Musk. We are in the “intervention area” for the National Broadband Plan (NBP), an area where the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications has earmarked 544,000 premises for high-speed broadband access.

It’s the hope that gets you in the end. After regular checks of the NBP website about updates for connection, the cold, hard truth of reality dawned. ...