Fiber deployment could generate about $3.24 trillion "in terms of net present value (NPV) in incremental economic impact," a study released Wednesday by Frontier and the Fiber Broadband Association said. Conducted by the Brattle Group, the study found that deploying fiber to the roughly 56 million unserved households could generate about $1.64 trillion in NPV by increasing home values. Fiber deployment could also increase household income by $1.6 trillion in NPV, the study said. "Fiber is the best technology for connecting homes and businesses," said Frontier CEO Nick Jeffery. FBA CEO Gary Bolton said the study "makes it clear" that government programs "need to prioritize funding for fiber over any other high-speed connections."
The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied Securus' motion to stay the FCC’s incarcerated people's communications services order, the court ruled Monday. It didn't detail why it ruled against Securus. “Having carefully reviewed the specific arguments Securus offers in favor of a stay, the motion is hereby denied, without prejudice to later revisitation of relevant points in briefing and during merits review,” the court said. Securus had argued that the FCC’s order violates the 2022 Martha Wright-Reed Just and Reasonable Communications Act and would “irreparably harm Securus if allowed to take effect." The order’s effective date was Tuesday. The FCC order “will increase the likelihood that correctional agencies will reduce communications options in the absence of necessary safety and security services” and “materially inhibit competition in the marketplace.”
Proposals in the submarine cable NPRM on the FCC's Nov. 21 agenda (see 2410310048) could undermine deployment of fiber optic subset cable infrastructure, according to the International Connectivity Coalition. Meeting with the offices of the five FCC commissioners, ICC representatives said U.S. data flows could become more centralized -- and vulnerable -- without continued infrastructure growth and landing site diversification. ICC members urged that the NPRM be aligned to specific national security risks and that there be inquiries into such issues as subset cable resiliency and the importance of trusted suppliers, said a filing posted Monday in docket 24-153.
As incumbent local exchange carriers make plans to decommission their copper networks, they could see big benefits in reporting recovery of that copper as "avoided emissions" of carbon, Analysys Mason's Rupert Wood blogged Friday. Most ILECs will likely fully decommission their copper by 2035, and many well before then, Wood said. The estimated carbon cost of recycling copper from removed cables varies, but all those estimates show a far smaller carbon footprint than the carbon cost of producing carbon from ore, he said. While the operator and recycler must agree about sharing the emissions savings, copper recovery from telephone networks could be reported as avoided carbon, he said.
As its cable landing license application is processed, Trans Americas Fiber (TAF) in the meantime is asking the FCC for special temporary authority to build and test portions of the TAM-1 submarine cable system in U.S. territory. In an application posted Friday, TAF said that without such authority, "connectivity on the TAM-1 system would likely be delayed at significant cost" to it. The 7,010-kilometer TAM-1 would connect Florida, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico and Panama.
The FCC extended for up to six years its freeze on federal-state jurisdictional separations of telecom costs and revenue for rate-of-return incumbent local exchange carriers (see 2407020017). Separations rules "play a substantially diminished role in allocating costs between the interstate and intrastate jurisdictions," the agency said in an order Thursday in docket 80-286. The FCC referred to the Federal-State Joint Board on Jurisdictional Separations the issue of whether to permanently freeze the rules and whether carriers still using separations should be allowed to unfreeze their category relationship every few years. The freeze expires Dec. 31, 2030, or after it receives a Joint Board recommendation.
The FCC Wireline and Wireless bureaus and the Office of International Affairs want comments by Dec. 9, replies by Dec. 24, on Frontier's proposed sale to Verizon, said a public notice Tuesday in docket 24-445 (see 2410250040). The companies announced the $20 billion deal in September (see 2409050010).
The FCC wants oppositions by Nov. 25 concerning multiple pending petitions for reconsideration of the commission's order implementing the Martha Wright-Reed Act, said a notice in Friday's Federal Register (see 2411070040). Replies to oppositions to the petitions are due by Dec. 5 in docket 23-62. Stephen Raher, Deaf Equality and TDIAccess, NCIC Communications and HomeWAV filed petitions.
The FCC Wireline Bureau extended several comment deadlines concerning pending proceedings on incarcerated people's communications services, said an order Friday in docket 23-62. Public interest groups sought the extension (see 2411040059). Reply comments on the commission's NPRM are now due by Dec. 17. Replies on the commission's annual reports public notice are now due by Dec. 9. Paperwork Reduction Act comments are due by Jan. 7.
Mercury Broadband surrendered dozens of additional census block groups it won in the FCC's Rural Digital Opportunity Fund Phase I auction (see 2410250006). In a letter posted Wednesday in docket 19-126, the ISP said that a dramatic increase in deployment costs and "competitive encroachment" rendered many of the census block groups "economically unviable and ultimately unachievable."