City Ponders Led Lighting
Higher-efficiency LED street lamps cost about $700 more per lamp than those in use in Stratford now
, but city officials were advised it's time to start making a move to the energy-saving lights.
Ken Levy, operations manager with Festival Hydro, credited the public-works subcommittee for being "very astute" in considering the change, which he says can bring savings both in maintenance and energy use.
Levy advised, however, against the idea of replacing individual street lamps with new LED (light-emitting diode) lamps, explaining that different quality and colour of lighting can be problematic.
Instead, he suggested installing LEDs in some sections of the city as pilot projects and gathering feedback. "I think we still need to be in the test stages," he said.
As with computers, the cost of LEDs is expected to fall as their popularity grows and that's expected to happen fairly quickly, he said.
Levy said there's a need to define the standard of LED lighting to keep it consistent.
Coun. George Brown has been particularly interested in finding out how the city might save energy costs by replacing the current high-pressure sodium lamps with LEDs. He suggested it may be time to make LEDs a requirement for new subdivisions.
The tender, which calls for 23,600 various shaped and sized bulbs for government premises, is due in December, but it includes no provision for the more eco friendly bulbs, which consume less than a third of the power of conventional bulbs and last more than three times longer.
According to one LED lighting retailer, the tender is a wasted opportunity for the government to reduce its carbon footprint and save hundreds of thousands of euros in electricity prices and maintenance costs every year.
Even if the government switches just one type of bulb types to LED, for example to a 600mm bulb of which 15,000 are requested in the tender, the government could save 213,500 in electricity costs per annum: and that is assuming electricity prices remain at todays levels.
There is one downside to LED bulbs: Initially, the government would be required to spend around nine times more per unit (28 compared to 3) but over the course of the whole of the average 600mm LED bulbs 20 years lifespan, potentially save more than 4 million.
Asked why they were not making the switch now, finance ministry procurement officer Tatiana Fala said there were concerns within the governments electrical and mechanical service (EMS), which supplies the technical specifications for the tender, about the quality of LED technology.
We do have (LED lights) in mind and we may introduce them next year, but now they are very new technology said Fala, adding that there were few LED providers in Cyprus and a tendering process would therefore not be competitive. We dont want to give out a tender for just one or two companies.
However, one supplier of green electrical lighting dismissed the finance ministrys claims, saying that Limassol Municipalitys recent tender for LED Christmas lights attracted six or seven LED suppliers.
Asked about the reliability of LEDs, he said they last on average 50,000 hours or around 20 years based on a 250 day working year compared with fluorescents lifespan of 15,000 hours (6 years).
LEDs could benefit the government in other ways too: Apart from saving money, and reducing electricity consumption, there are also other benefits to the use of LEDs. These include the obvious reduction in their carbon footprint, but also in the environmental issue of disposing of fluorescent tubes which contain mercury and therefore require special handling.
He added: Additionally the effort required to replace the LEDs is less than a third of that for fluorescents due to the much longer lifespan of LEDs.
In general speaking,
12V LED has become more and more affordable, therefore
auto LED bulbs have been used widely.
by: alishushu
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