Author
Damien O’Sullivan
We believe innovation is one of our industry’s greatest tools for reducing our environmental footprint.
That’s why we’re excited to announce that the CTA and NCTA’s US Small Network Equipment (SNE) Voluntary Agreement (VA) just won Environmental Leader’s Project of the Year Award. This award recognizes the huge strides that the signatories have taken to produce home internet equipment—such as modems and routers—that meets the high energy efficiency targets set forth in the agreement.
We’re particularly proud to share that we exceeded the signatory commitment, by meeting the agreement’s guidelines on 99% of our applicable shipments.
Collectively, the US SNE VA has already improved the efficiency of home internet devices by 20%. The CTA and NCTA have also announced a four-year extension to the agreement to further reduce energy usage by 11% over current levels by 2020.
That’s a big deal, and it’s been one of our most important initiatives. You see, we not only took a leadership role in establishing the SNE VA; we continue to develop its technical requirements in the interest of energy efficiency. That includes, for example, developing recommendations for new SNE devices and interface types based on measuring the requirements for new residential gateways with 4G/5G fixed wireless access WAN interfaces, 2.5/10Gbps optical WAN interfaces, and Wi-Fi 6 technology.
Our work with the SNE VA is a natural extension of our Conservation through Innovation philosophy, which encompasses our business’ general approach to product development and sustainability as well as an even broader set of technologies—ranging from the network to the cloud and home.
For example, our Network DVR technology saves a significant amount of energy by putting subscriber-recorded programming in the cloud and thereby conserving the processing power and energy consumption ofthe associated devices in the home.
In the network, we continue to improve our widely deployed E6000® Converged Edge Router (CER), leveraging standards-based technology that reduces energy consumption in the headend for the world’s leading service providers. Our design teams have found innovative ways to reduce power consumption for each E6000 module in CCAP Core/R-PHY deployments by up to as much as 55%.
We’re also looking ahead and laying the groundwork for substantial consolidated energy savings in the home, through the development of a new category of connected video equipment we call Smart Media Devices. They combine the features from some of the most popular devices in the home—including set-tops, speakers, voice assistants, and more. Meanwhile, the Power Saving Mode on our broadband devices reduces energy usage while the equipment sits idle. And our new Wi-Fi 6 devices will showcase our application of the latest technology to improve overall energy efficiency, supporting a range of future client devices that will leverage Wi-Fi 6 to remain in low-power operation for longer periods of time.
Finally, we collaborate and provide technical leadership in energy efficiency initiatives around the world—including the Australian, European, Canadian, and US energy efficiency voluntary agreements for set-tops and small network equipment. Our teams also chair working groups for the SCTE Energy 2020 initiatives.
At CommScope, we believe it’s crucial to innovate with a total lifecycle perspective on the environmental impact of our technology. And, as a result, our combined company reached important internal sustainability milestones:
- ARRIS reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 17.6% in 2018 compared to its 2013 baseline
- CommScope achieved a 77% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in 2015 from its 2008 baseline
Through innovation, we can shape both the future of connectivity and conservation.
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