AT&T is advancing the shutdown of its legacy copper telecommunications services, while CenturyLink continues publishing network retirement notices covering several U.S. states. Federal regulatory changes have reduced procedural requirements associated with retiring aging telecommunications infrastructure, reinforcing a transition that could eventually affect the availability of copper cable and telecommunications equipment for recovery.
For metals recyclers and IT asset disposition (ITAD) providers, the commercial opportunity remains difficult to quantify. A carrier can retire copper facilities without removing the cable, and some network disclosures concern infrastructure that is already out of use. Actual material recovery depends on separate engineering decisions and whether physical removal is authorized.
The distinction is particularly important following changes to the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) network disclosure procedures. Recovery companies seeking intelligence about potential projects now rely more heavily on carrier disclosures and evidence of actual construction or decommissioning work.
Key Findings & Outlook
- AT&T has established a substantial copper retirement timetable. Its 2025 annual report states that the company powered down its first wire center in 2025 and obtained approval to discontinue copper-based services in more than 30% of its wire centers by the end of 2026. AT&T expects to shut down a large majority of those services by the end of 2029.
- The federal disclosure process changed in 2025. The FCC’s Wireline Competition Bureau waived network-change filing requirements for two years in March 2025, along with the associated FCC public notices and objection procedures. The commission’s March 2026 order eliminated those federal filing requirements. Carrier websites and industry disclosure channels remain important sources of retirement intelligence.
- Some CenturyLink retirements involve inactive infrastructure. Its March 13, 2026 Oregon Notice 1001 identifies copper facilities with no working circuits and states that no replacement facilities had been deployed. The notice illustrates how network retirement can proceed without replacement construction.
- Physical removal is documented as a requirement in specific AT&T construction-related projects. Florida disclosures identify requests by transportation authorities and local governments to remove or relocate facilities affected by road and infrastructure projects. The notices establish requests for physical work, although they do not confirm completed recycling.
- Commercial recovery depends on project-level information. Cable specifications, actual removal requirements and ownership rights remain essential to evaluating potential supply.
AT&T’s copper retirement timetable
AT&T’s 2025 annual report provides evidence of the scale of its legacy-network transition. The company reported that it fully powered down its first wire center in 2025 and had received approval to discontinue copper-based services in more than 30% of its wire centers by the end of 2026.
Management also stated that it remained on track to shut down a large majority of copper-based services by the end of 2029. The figures describe different stages of retirement: a completed wire-center shutdown, regulatory approval to discontinue services and a broader company objective extending through the decade.
The transition accompanies AT&T’s continuing investment in fiber infrastructure. The company reported 32 million fiber customer locations at the end of 2025 and expected to exceed 40 million by the end of 2026. Its longer-term target is more than 60 million locations by 2030.
These developments establish a substantial telecommunications modernization program. They do not establish the quantity of copper that will be physically removed. A wire center can cease providing copper-based services while portions of its outside-plant infrastructure remain installed.
Fiber construction also cannot be translated directly into recovered copper quantities because network routes and physical replacement requirements vary. For recovery companies, AT&T’s timetable provides a basis for identifying potential future projects, but commercial forecasts require more detailed information about actual cable removal and equipment disposition.
FCC filing requirements changed in 2025
The FCC’s Wireline Competition Bureau issued an order on March 20, 2025, waiving network-change filing requirements for two years. The waiver also covered the FCC’s public notice procedures for short-term network changes and copper retirements, together with the associated objection process for interconnected service providers.
The commission adopted additional changes on March 26, 2026, eliminating the federal network-change filing requirements and codifying the approach introduced by the earlier waiver. Incumbent local exchange carriers remain responsible for making planned network-change notices publicly available through their websites or recognized industry disclosure channels.
Carriers must also provide direct notification to specified interconnected service providers and entities involved in supporting 911 services, as required by the revised framework. The applicable notice periods depend on the circumstances of the planned retirement and whether affected facilities are carrying active services.
The March 2025 waiver had already shifted public monitoring away from routine FCC filings. The 2026 order made that procedural change permanent within the revised federal rules, reinforcing the importance of disclosures published directly by telecommunications carriers.
The commission also expressly found that federal law preempts state and local requirements to the extent that they needlessly constrain the discontinuance of legacy services and retirement of legacy networks. This preemption reduces certain regulatory barriers to telecommunications modernization, although the precise effect depends on the applicable federal authorization and circumstances of the proposed discontinuance.
The regulatory changes do not require carriers to physically extract retired cable or establish when recovered material will enter recycling markets. For equipment recovery companies, the practical consequence is greater reliance on carrier-issued disclosures, with additional investigation needed to determine whether physical removal is involved.
CenturyLink’s notices show the importance of idle infrastructure
CenturyLink’s public network-disclosure archive contains recurring announcements concerning copper retirement and other network changes. Its October 5, 2026 entries include notices for Minnesota and Florida, while September announcements include Notice 1101 for Colorado and Notice 1098 covering Montana and Oregon.
Some of these disclosures concern infrastructure that is no longer supporting active circuits. Their significance for recyclers lies in the distinction between retiring unused facilities and commissioning physical removal.
CenturyLink’s Notice 1001, issued March 13, 2026, provides a documented example. The notice concerns copper facilities in the Sweet Home, Oregon, wire center and states that the company is retiring the facilities because they have no working circuits.
The disclosure also states that no replacement facilities had been deployed and that the company would assess future replacement needs as necessary. The announced effective date was March 28, 2026.
This represents a different situation from a network modernization project involving replacement construction. CenturyLink is formally retiring facilities that its records identify as having no active retail or wholesale circuits. The notice does not establish a corresponding construction project or the physical extraction of those cables.
For metals recyclers, this distinction is commercially significant. Retiring idle infrastructure does not necessarily create a near-term scrap supply opportunity, even when the carrier identifies a specific geographic area and effective retirement date.
A recovery company cannot assume that the announcement will produce recoverable material simply because the copper facilities are being retired. The more useful question is whether the carrier has separately authorized removal work.
CenturyLink’s notices therefore provide geographic intelligence about legacy-network retirement. They become actionable commercial leads when additional evidence establishes that equipment will be physically released or removed.
Copper retirement and physical removal remain distinct
Copper retirement notice rules existed before the FCC’s technology-transition proceedings. The commission’s 2015 Technology Transitions Order expanded the definition of copper retirement to encompass the removal or disabling of covered copper facilities and certain replacements with fiber.
The 2015 order also distinguished physical removal from other forms of retirement. Facilities can cease performing their telecommunications functions while remaining installed, and the commission discussed circumstances in which existing copper infrastructure could continue providing structural support or line power.
The framework has since been amended. In 2017, the FCC eliminated the provision treating failure to maintain copper infrastructure as a form of de facto retirement. The 2026 order subsequently revised the federal disclosure procedures.
For recyclers, the distinction between operational retirement and physical extraction remains commercially significant. A facility can be removed from active service without producing material available for processing, and its retirement date does not independently establish when physical removal will occur.
This creates a fundamental forecasting limitation. Regulatory retirement counts cannot be converted into recovered copper tonnage without evidence of the assets physically extracted.
Even a substantial network shutdown program may produce uneven recovery activity. The relationship between retirement and recycling depends on the circumstances of individual infrastructure projects and the carrier’s decisions about remaining equipment.
Florida projects provide evidence of physical removal requests
AT&T Florida’s public disclosures offer more direct evidence of situations in which network retirement intersects with physical infrastructure work.
A July 21, 2025 notice concerning distribution area 123005 in the Indian Creek Wire Center identifies a road construction project in Surfside, Florida. AT&T stated that the City of Surfside had requested removal or relocation of facilities interfering with the project before December 30, 2025. The notice listed September 4, 2025, as its expected effective date.
More recent disclosures identify construction-related retirement activity in Yulee and Daytona Beach. A January 9, 2026 filing describes copper facilities serving distribution areas 200330 and 2003A in the Yulee Wire Center, associated with a Florida Department of Transportation project involving David Hallman Parkway and Chester Road in Nassau County.
FDOT requested removal or relocation of conflicting facilities before January 30, 2026. The same filing identifies distribution areas 1111B, 2208C and 2208E in the Fentress Wire Center in Daytona Beach, associated with a stormwater conveyance improvement project along Morris Boulevard.
These notices establish a relationship between telecommunications retirement and construction activity. They identify infrastructure affected by public projects and provide evidence of requests for physical removal or relocation.
They do not establish that the work was completed or that the affected copper entered recycling channels. Relocation can result in infrastructure remaining in service elsewhere, while removal does not necessarily result in material being sold to an independent recycler.
For recovery companies, construction-related notices provide stronger leads than general service-retirement announcements because they identify projects that require physical work. Commercial qualification still requires confirmation of the material released and the organization authorized to dispose of it.
Copper recovery depends on removal economics
Telecommunications cable can contain commercially valuable quantities of copper, but the recoverable quantity depends on conductor dimensions and cable construction. Insulation and protective materials also influence processing requirements.
The physical environment in which cable is installed affects the cost of extracting it. Underground infrastructure can require specialized access or excavation, while aerial cable removal presents different operating conditions. The economics of each project depend on its engineering requirements and contractual arrangements.
An important commercial distinction exists between cable extracted during already scheduled construction and cable removed solely to recover its metal content. Where removal is required for a road project, some field-work costs may be associated with the underlying construction program.
That does not establish that recovered cable will be sold to recyclers or that its sale will be profitable. A standalone recovery project requires a separate economic assessment, taking into account the cost of safely removing and transporting the material.
For metals processors, useful commercial information begins with the type of cable and the expected quantity available for delivery. Retirement notices alone cannot establish either.
Network electronics present a separate ITAD opportunity
CenturyLink’s network-disclosure archive includes equipment-specific decommissioning notices alongside copper retirement announcements. On April 27, 2026, it listed Notice 1025 for a switch decommissioning in Florida and Notice 1026 for a tandem decommissioning in Arizona.
These notices provide evidence that the carrier’s network-change activity includes telecommunications electronics as well as outside-plant facilities. They do not establish complete inventories of equipment being released for resale or recycling.
Analytical inference: Central-office and remote-network equipment could represent a separate opportunity for ITAD providers. Some electronic assemblies may retain secondary-market value where compatible networks remain in operation, while others could be directed toward component or material recovery.
The potential resale market depends on the continuing use of compatible systems and the condition of the retired equipment. A network decommissioning notice cannot independently establish that electronic hardware has been made available for commercial recovery.
ITAD providers also need to distinguish the organizations controlling these assets from those responsible for outside-plant cable removal. Carrier asset management groups may oversee equipment disposition under arrangements different from construction contracts covering physical cable infrastructure.
For companies serving telecommunications clients, the appropriate commercial approach is to assess equipment retirement separately from copper recovery. The relevant assets and procurement arrangements can differ substantially.
Environmental handling requires material-specific information
Material composition can affect the economics and environmental requirements of cable recovery. An EPA life-cycle assessment of selected wire and cable insulation and jacketing formulations examined environmental characteristics associated with materials including PVC systems using lead-based stabilizers.
The assessment provides technical background concerning selected cable formulations, but it cannot establish the composition of a particular telecommunications cable being retired by AT&T or CenturyLink.
Lead-clad telecommunications infrastructure presents another consideration. AT&T’s 2025 annual report acknowledges litigation and government inquiries concerning allegations about potential health and environmental risks associated with legacy lead-clad cables. The company also identifies the possibility of additional litigation or regulation.
Those disclosures establish the existence of legal and environmental exposure. They do not demonstrate that every retired copper telecommunications cable contains lead.
Recyclers evaluating prospective shipments should establish material composition and applicable handling requirements before determining processing arrangements. For network owners, documented material characterization can also help establish appropriate downstream disposition procedures.
Ownership determines access to recovered material
A copper retirement notice does not establish who owns the affected cable after physical removal. The carrier may retain title to recovered infrastructure, while engineering contractors can be responsible for performing the work.
Other contractual arrangements could address salvage proceeds or material transfer rights differently. These possibilities make procurement arrangements central to assessing commercial opportunities.
A recycler receiving material from a field contractor needs confirmation that the supplier is authorized to transfer it. An ITAD provider pursuing electronic equipment should establish which carrier organization controls asset retirement and disposition.
Where equipment has already been physically removed, commercial evaluation can proceed from a more concrete inventory. Prospective removal projects require additional information about timing and the quantity ultimately expected to become available.
The distinction affects commercial forecasting. A regulatory notice identifies an infrastructure change, while an authorized material release establishes a potential supply transaction.
Industry Outlook
AT&T’s copper-service shutdown timetable and CenturyLink’s continuing network disclosures establish an active transition away from legacy telecommunications infrastructure.
The FCC’s regulatory changes have reduced federal disclosure requirements and reinforced the importance of carrier-issued retirement notices. The filing changes began with the March 2025 waiver and were subsequently codified through the March 2026 order.
For metals recyclers, regulatory progress does not provide a reliable measure of recoverable copper. Some retirements involve idle facilities with no working circuits and no replacement infrastructure deployed. Those circumstances leave substantial uncertainty about whether physical removal will occur.
Construction-related projects offer a more specific category of potential opportunity. AT&T’s Florida disclosures show that transportation and municipal infrastructure work can generate requests to remove or relocate copper facilities.
Even in those circumstances, the quantity of material reaching recyclers remains unverified until actual removal and disposition arrangements are established.
For ITAD providers, telecommunications electronics present a related area for investigation. CenturyLink’s switch and tandem decommissioning announcements demonstrate that equipment retirement is part of the broader infrastructure transition, although individual asset inventories and disposition arrangements still need to be established.
For carrier sustainability and asset management executives, distinguishing operational retirement from physical recovery will become increasingly important. Tracking both events separately would provide a clearer account of the material consequences of network modernization.
The outlook supports targeted commercial research into confirmed projects. It does not support treating the growing number of copper retirements as a direct forecast of recycling volumes.
Strategic Recommendations
ITAD and telecommunications infrastructure recovery providers
- Use carrier disclosures as the primary monitoring channel. The FCC’s network-change filing relief began in March 2025. Carrier websites and industry disclosure channels provide the relevant starting points for identifying planned retirements.
- Distinguish idle infrastructure from physical removal projects. Check whether notices describe facilities with no working circuits and whether replacement facilities have been deployed. Prioritize opportunities supported by confirmed engineering work.
- Evaluate electronics separately from cable. Monitor switch and tandem decommissioning notices, establish the equipment types being retired and determine whether viable reuse markets exist before estimating asset recovery value.
Copper and downstream metals recyclers
- Prioritize projects with verified removal requirements. Road construction and other infrastructure projects may create more concrete opportunities than regulatory retirement notices alone. Confirm whether equipment will be physically extracted and available for authorized transfer.
- Require material specifications. Obtain reliable information about cable construction and quantities before quoting purchase terms or committing processing capacity.
- Verify salvage rights. Establish which organization owns recovered material and who can legally authorize its transfer.
Carrier sustainability and asset management executives
- Track service retirement separately from physical extraction. Record when infrastructure is disconnected and whether the associated material is subsequently removed.
- Document downstream disposition. Where equipment enters reuse or recycling channels, retain records of quantities transferred and the organizations receiving the material.
- Include recovery assessments in engineering planning. Projects requiring physical removal offer opportunities to evaluate material disposition alongside construction requirements.
Sources
- AT&T — 2025 Annual Report. Copper retirement timetable, fiber expansion and disclosures concerning lead-clad telecommunications cables. https://about.att.com/ecms/dam/snrdocs/2025-annual-report-complete-annual-report.pdf
- FCC — Network Change Disclosure Waiver Order, DA 25-252, March 20, 2025. Temporary waiver of federal filing and associated notice procedures. https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-25-252A1.pdf
- FCC — Network Modernization Order, FCC 26-19, March 2026. Revised network-change filing and notification requirements, and federal preemption findings. https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-26-19A1.pdf
- CenturyLink — Network Disclosures. Copper retirement and equipment decommissioning announcements, including Notices 1025 and 1026 dated April 27, 2026. https://www.centurylink.com/aboutus/legal/network-disclosures.html
- CenturyLink — Notice 1001, Oregon, March 13, 2026. Copper retirement in Sweet Home, Oregon, covering facilities without working circuits or replacement facilities already deployed. https://www.centurylink.com/content/dam/home/about-us/legal/network-disclosures/1001%20Copper%20Retirements%20OR%20031326%20CTL.pdf
- CenturyLink — Notice 1101, Colorado, September 14, 2026. https://www.centurylink.com/content/dam/home/about-us/legal/network-disclosures/1101%20Copper%20Retirements%20CO%20091426%20CTL.pdf
- CenturyLink — Notice 1098, Montana and Oregon, September 8, 2026. https://www.centurylink.com/content/dam/home/about-us/legal/network-disclosures/1098%20Copper%20Retirements%20MT%20OR%20090826%20CTL.pdf
- AT&T Florida — Notice FL-25-0026, Indian Creek/Surfside, July 21, 2025. https://cpr.att.com/pdf/fl/notice/FL-25-0026.pdf
- AT&T Florida — Filing FL-26-0002, Yulee and Daytona Beach, January 9, 2026. https://cpr.att.com/pdf/fl/filings/appr/FL-26-0002.pdf
- FCC — Technology Transitions Order, FCC 15-97 (2015). Expansion of the copper retirement definition. https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-15-97A1_Rcd.pdf
- FCC — Wireline Infrastructure Order, FCC 17-154 (2017). Changes to the de facto copper retirement framework. https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-17-154A1.pdf
- U.S. EPA — Wire and Cable Insulation and Jacketing: Life-Cycle Assessments for Selected Applications. https://nepis.epa.gov/Exe/ZyPURL.cgi?Dockey=P1000LF1.TXT