Aspects of the subject disclosure may include, for example, obtaining data relating to a user equipment communicatively coupled to a first network node, the data including information regarding a data buffer associated with the user equipment, obtaining node information relating to a second network node, the node information identifying available network resources of the second network node and a coverage range of the second network node, determining, based on the information regarding the data buffer, that a status of the data buffer satisfies a condition, determining that the first network node has insufficient network resources to satisfy a network resource demand of the user equipment based on the determining that the status of the data buffer satisfies the condition, and selectively activating the second network node, based on the available network resources of the second network node and the coverage range of the second network node. Other embodiments are disclosed.