But you simply cannot get the same capacity over a twisted-pair copper line intended for an analog phone 50 years ago.

So far, the company has laid 800,000 miles of cable: less than 2 percent of the copper lines.

An insulated copper line from that led up to an alligator clip attached to one of the telephone wires.

"Their money is green," he said, and Qwest's "copper lines are just sitting there" waiting to be used.

Telephone calls are traditionally carried to and from homes on copper lines, with routing of the traffic using circuit switch technology.

But even if such devices have been removed, he said, "you might see copper lines coming through the wall behind the furnace or boiler."

However, some commercial and residential units still use copper lines to provide "last mile" access to customers.

They were so far behind that they said: "We're not going to lay copper lines all over China.

Another potential advantage is that there appear to be technical limits on the amount of information that a copper line can carry.

While the wires are identical to the copper lines found in any home, the signals traveling on them are not.