Dustbins could 'go online' with 5G, says Ofcom And Steve Unger, Ofcom's chief technology officer, told The Daily Telegraph, the even faster connections afforded by 5G would herald a new era of "Smart Cities," and unprecedented machine to machine communication. Ofcom will next week reveal there are already 5m smart devices, such as gas and electricity meters connected to the internet, up 30pc on last year. "So we are starting to consider which categories of smart devices will need licences from Ofcom, and which might be 'licence-exempt" to allow greater flexibility." Ofcom revealed last November that the explosion in mobile data meant that 5G would be a necessity by the end of the decade. Ofcom calculates that mobile data consumption has more than doubled in the past year, and even a cautious forecast suggests it will be 80 times higher in 2030. Mr Unger, who has a doctorate in astrophysics, reiterated that Ofcom hoped to be in a position to auction off 5G licences by 2018, adding that in theory the auction could take place a year earlier. Ofcom plans to use the 700mhz frequency currently used by Freeview for the new service, risking another battle with broadcasters who were initially furious that 4G services were carried on the 800mhz band. Mr Unger said broadcasters had been "haggling" with the regulator, but that he believed they would accept the need for 5G and would ultimately benefit from it. Other 5G services are expected to run at 2.3ghz and 3.5ghz, bandwiths currently used by the Ministry of Defence in places such as Salisbury Plain. Handset manufacturers such as Samsung believe speeds on 5G could reach peaks of 1GB per second. Most 4G speeds are currently around 20MB a second. Mr Unger said: "We are all expecting major growth in mobile data, and if that's happening, we need to be ready for it. If it doesn't happen, there won't be enough capacity to meet demand. Everyone accepts it's going to happen. He added: "Rather than 4G being the end of the story, it's almost right at the start. We can see applications that need to go beyond 4G.