On the basis of their studies and experiments, a group of scientists and engineers at Bell Labs – which is the research division of telecom-equipment giant Alcatel-Lucent (ALU) – said on Monday that, theoretically speaking, the global telecommunications networks can become 1,000 times more energy-efficient than what they presently are.

A Bell Labs-organized global consortium, called Green Touch, has set a 2015 deadline for determining as well as demonstrating the manner in which carbon emissions from all global networks can be reduced ‘dramatically.’

The groups’ somewhat ambitious expectations – about a thousand-fold reduction in energy consumption by global networks - include the hope that the amount of energy that currently powers the Internet and other global networks for one day will, in due course, be almost sufficient to power them for three years.

The agenda of the group will be fueled by two main issues, namely – global networks are consuming more energy at a faster pace due to increased demand; and these networks use more energy than they need to.

In a Monday statement, ALU noted that the existing networks have apparently not been designed keeping the energy-efficiency factor in mind. Saying that the networks have largely been “optimized around performance and simplicity,” ALU added that hardly any attention is paid towards optimizing them to run on less energy.