A power aware Point-Of-Presence design and auto-configuration method is disclosed for configuring which network elements within a point-of-presence are powered so as to accommodate anticipated traffic while minimizing power consumption. The IP power aware Point-Of-Presence design and auto-configuration method includes a set of activation thresholds associated with each port in the Point-of-Presence that indicates that the port should be activated when the traffic demand exceeds the threshold. The power aware Point-Of-Presence design and auto-configuration method is particularly useful for providing a configuration which accounts for both external and internal link traffic demand and has the further advantage of ordering the port activation such that only a minimum number of activation and deactivation operations to satisfy a new demand is required. This property is advantageous for limiting the routing instabilities caused by topological changes in response to varying demand.