"Instead of fixating on how much carbon the telecom network is emitting, operators should capitalize on how much carbon the network is saving," according to Joe Madden, Chief Analyst at Mobile Experts research company. comments.

His comments come as the firm has released a new report that says “operators would be wise to shut down their old 2G and 3G networks.

Global telco is approaching $1.5 trillion in annual revenue, according to Gartner research. It constitutes more than 30% of all ICT spending.

Telco consumes 2% to 3% of the world's electricity grid, according to one Environmental Leader, which also says telcos are planning to installed more than 120GW of sustainable energy to support their needs by 2030. This would about match current consumption, which is similar to the energy consumption of datacenters worldwide.

For its part, Mobile Experts research shows that cooling and running access networks – known as RANs, or Radio Access Networks, in the telco industry – consume more than 70% of the energy needed by a typical mobile operator.

Deploying automated 5G, and now 6G, networks constitutes an “overhaul” in the way mobile operators approach energy consumption and innovation, the report found. In fact, “we've identified a few applications where mobile automation saves 20X as much power as it consumes,” Madden says.