Vodafone It is in need of changes that help to be more profitable and, why not, to recover a certain position within the telecommunications market in Spain. One of these changes that entails lower maintenance costs and therefore greater profitability is the closure of ADSL exchanges.
The red operator has already given an account of when it plans to have its facilities closed or at least dismantled and converted. current copper exchanges that provide ADSL services. Fortunately, as 80% of the work has already been done, this definitive closure should occur in less than a year.
Vodafone dates the closure of its ADSL exchanges
According to recent data, Vodafone has already migrated almost 80% of its copper installations in Spain to fiber. With so much of the work done, the operator of British origin intends dismantle all its copper plants that provide ADSL services in less than a year.
Specifically, according to data that El Confidencial has accessed, they will close their ADSL service centers, which together total 1,107 facilities, to mid-2024. As we said, almost 80% of this total has already been turned off, some 881 plants.
This is already being noticed in the energy saving associated with this step to a more energy efficient technology such as fiber optics. Specifically, Vodafone Spain has saved 28.52 GWh in total energy consumption in the last fiscal year. This helps to reduce annual total energy consumption due to data traffic, which went from 52.8 kWh/TB to 45.177kWh/TB, according to data corresponding to April 2022 to March 2023. This increases energy savings. by 7% despite an increase in fixed and mobile network data traffic of 11.4%.
All this while increasing fiber deployment that also benefits the end user. According to the latest data provided by Vodafone Spain, the expansion of its own fiber network means that it has already reached 10.6 million real estate units.
Migrate to fiber optics
In addition to the dismantling of the infrastructure that supports ADSL, Vodafone has also replaced both the UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) and older power equipment. With this, they are updated with newer models that manage to reduce energy losses and improve the energy performance of the facilities. «The extensive use of cooling systems based on free cooling and the implementation of new intelligent climate control systems “are reducing the energy demand of the infrastructure associated with telecommunications equipment”. To these measures have been added processes of consolidation and virtualization of the new generation CORE network. 
It must be remembered that these changes do not affect the user’s pocket. The process of migration from copper to fiber optics is something widespread that, for example, in Movistar is also advancing steadily so that next year there will be no trace left (with the exception of the case of San Sebastián). The user who currently has Vodafone ADSL and the center that provides it is going to be closed, will be duly informed of this closure and will be offered migrate to fiber optics at no additional cost. In some cases, you may even benefit on your monthly Internet bill.