MADRID, 23 Abr. (EUROPA PRESS) -

Telefónica will mark another milestone next Tuesday on its way to shut down its copper network with the closure of 24 plants and the end of the guarantee, which begins the period in which it does not accept registrations, in another 260.

The company will thus carry out the first major shutdown of copper plants in 2023 just a few days after announcing that it will shut down this network on April 19, 2024, the day of its centenary.

According to the list sent to the regulator, consulted by Europa Press, Ávila and Ourense, with four plants per province, will be the ones that concentrate the greatest number of closures on this occasion.

In the case of the 262 plants in which registrations will no longer be accepted, Cáceres stands out, where the service will be interrupted to offer wholesale copper lines in 19 plants.

The change from the copper network to fiber optics has led to the closure of the old power stations, since the new network requires much fewer installations of this type for its deployment.

In addition to providing greater speed and reliability, the migration to fiber optics also means considerable energy and emissions savings for telecommunication operators. In the case of Telefónica, the company indicates that it consumes 18 times less.

This step is one that the operator will take to meet its goal of being one of the first companies in the sector to turn off its copper network.

The company completed the notification of the orderly closure of the last 3,329 plants that remained to be included in the process to the National Commission for Markets and Competition (CNMC) last Tuesday and will complete the process next year.

To date, Telefónica has closed 2,236 copper plants, half of them last year, and aims to close another 730 during 2023, according to the latest list published by the CNMC. The complete network amounts to 8,532 exchanges.