Energy-Savings From Greener Broadband Equipment Could Power 70 New Data Centers Across Europe

FREMONT, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--15 January 2026: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYSC9_4mffg

Enabling connected devices in homes across Europe to enter standby mode will potentially save enough energy to power up to seventy new small data centers across the continent or the equivalent of a mid-size city, the Broadband Forum predicts.

The outcome of new power management standardization efforts will mean devices such as home gateways, repeaters, and set-top boxes, will be able to enter low-power, energy-saving or deep standby modes resulting in energy savings of up to 1.3 TWh (Terrawatt-hour)* in energy usage from homes across Europe, which is equivalent to powering the annual residential needs of cities, such as Athens, Copenhagen, or Lisbon.

“As connected homes grow increasingly sophisticated, energy efficiency is becoming a defining design consideration for broadband equipment,” said SoftAtHome Chief HGW Standardization Architect David Cluytens. “This work from the Broadband Forum reflects a collective global industry effort to align broadband technologies with sustainability objectives, such as those outlined in the French Energy Transition Law for Green Growth”, he continued.

The latest extensions embedded in the Broadband Forum’s TR-181 Issue 2 Amendment 20 Data Model will allow broadband service providers (BSPs) and manufacturers to design and introduce even smarter and more environmentally friendly products, while maintaining a high level of performance and service for customers.

The BBF’s TR-181 device data model, when used over a User Services Platform (USP/TR-369)-enabled network, introduces standardized mechanisms for controlling and monitoring power consumption of embedded network technologies, such as Wi-Fi, Ethernet, USB, xPON, and Thread. The TR-181 device data model allows BSPs to manage connected devices and ensures interoperability between devices and management software from different vendors.

“The latest power saving efforts highlight how the Broadband Forum’s members continue to look for ways to improve economic and environmental sustainability for the industry,” said Broadband Forum CEO Craig Thomas. “The TR-181 update represents a huge step forward for hitting sustainability targets in the years ahead.”

Significantly, remote power consumption monitoring for individual hardware components is enabled thanks to the update. The power management capability can be installed as a containerized solution in hardware from different vendors remotely.

The TR-181 update includes features such as Ethernet Energy Detect Power Down (EDPD), LED brightness management, CPU frequency scaling, and the ability to dynamically control the number of active Wi-Fi Rx/Tx antenna chains.

Read the latest blog article on the TR-181 update here.

Editor’s note:

• The 1.3 TWh estimate has been forecasted for approximately 200 million households in the EU having internet access, according to forecast data from ReportLinker.
• Orange estimates that turning off the 5GHz radio for 10 hours per day across approximately 11 million Livebox subscribers in France would save 64 GWh annually. The figure is based on turning off the Wi-Fi radio only, while the rest of the router (ONU, Ethernet switch, phone port, processor, and power supply) continues to run.
• The estimate assumes similar power profiles of routers from other providers.

About the Broadband Forum

The Broadband Forum is an industry-driven global standards development organization helping operators, application providers, and vendors deliver better, services-led broadband.

As the industry-recognized center of competence, the Broadband Forum provides an accessible, efficient, and effective community where all broadband stakeholders can collaborate on, develop, and promote open standards and open software. This provides the basis for deployable solutions for the global broadband industry.

The Broadband Forum publishes interoperable standards and open software, has launched certification programs, and promotes industry education. These best practices and models can be adopted to help realize an effective broadband ecosystem that drives a thriving, services-led broadband industry based on global collaboration, open standards, and open source, maximizing value for all stakeholders.

For more information, visit https://www.broadband-forum.org/. For the latest updates, follow Broadband Forum on LinkedIn, Twitter, and YouTube.