More than 98% of new modems, routers and other internet equipment purchased and sold last year for U.S. residential broadband subscribers met targeted energy efficiency levels, exceeding the goal of 90% set out in the industry voluntary agreement for small network equipment (SNE) led by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA)®, NCTA - The Internet & Television Association and CableLabs, according to a new independent audit report.  

Further, the report found that energy usage held steady even as average broadband speeds increased by 27% in 2021, and that the average energy usage of the equipment relative to broadband speed has decreased by more than 80% under the voluntary agreement.   

The parties also announced a major expansion and four-year extension of the SNE program including more stringent energy efficiency goals to become effective in 2023. Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E), the nation’s largest investor-owned utility, joined the extended agreement as the “energy efficiency advocate” to assure the rigor of its commitments and validate its progress. In addition to PG&E, eero (an Amazon company), Google, Sagemcom, and TP-Link also signed the agreement this year.   

“The broadband industry continues to make great strides towards advancing energy efficiency thanks to the signatories of this voluntary agreement,” said Doug Johnson, vice president of emerging technology policy, CTA. “As consumers bring more devices into their homes and connect to their Internet access equipment, they do so at a time when energy efficiency improvements continue to grow.”  

“We welcome the commitments of the new signatories to pursuing energy efficiency in a manner that also fosters continued innovation,” said Neal Goldberg, General Counsel of NCTA - The Internet & Television Association.  

Signatories of the voluntary agreement include the major U.S. broadband Internet service providers (Altice USA, AT&T, Charter, Comcast, Cox, Frontier, Lumen (formerly CenturyLink), and Verizon), manufacturers of SNE in the United States (Actiontec, ASUS, CommScope, eero, Google, Linksys, Netgear, Plume, Sagemcom, TP-Link, Vantiva (formerly Technicolor), and Ubee Interactive), and Pacific Gas & Electric. 

More information about the award-winning voluntary agreement and the industry’s energy efficiency efforts is available at www.energy-efficiency.us.