Power optimization of optical wide area networks

In this paper we explore scalable power efficient architectures for optical WAN. The network traffic we assume is 10-100 times larger than what it is today, the rationale being power efficiency will become the paramount obstacle in the next decade when network demands dramatically increases by orders of magnitude. We find using optical by bypass, optical switching at major nodes, WAN topology and capacity deployment and optical flow switching of large transactions are key attributes of a power efficient network.