On-Demand Street Lights Save Tons Of Energy

One town in northwest Germany is turning off its street lights at 9 pm to save electricity and money. Rather than imposing an unintentional curfew, the move is giving residents on-demand lighting.

The BBC reported this morning that in Doerentrup, a local engineer came up with a system so that anyone wanting see the way registers for free online, dials a central number, punches in a street code, and the lights they need will come on for several minutes. Although residents pay for the calls, the town collectively saves money on electricity.

Read the whole story here.

Comments

[manicallday]

I never saw the point of street lights anyway. If we all still drove horse and buggies then yes, but we don't. My bike even has a light, so what is the point?

[research]

Motion Sensing lights would solve the problem.

[sloreader]

So long as they wouldn't trigger for anything under 20 lbs or so, seems like a no brainer. Lots of $$ and energy savings. GREAT IDEA! Why not?

[research]

They would need to go to LED lighting at the same time, the on off cycling of the sodium and the Metal Halide/mercury lights would wear them out very quickly.

They should of course do that anyway, but it will take time.

[RightWingMarine]

what about the tourists that are lost at night? They won't have registered online, they won't know the number to call and they won't know the street code to turn the lights on.

[ibsteve2u]

GPS and flashlights.

[Myshkin57]

Yeah. A flashlight will deter muggers.

[sloreader]

Cumbersome to be sure. Motion detectors should work though.

[RightWingMarine]

I wonder if criminals would rather strike in an area that the lights default to off or if they stay on all the time.

[newshawk14]

For many years power companies in the US sold ratepayers on the idea of street lights
helping to prevent crime, all it did was make the streets safe for criminals at night.

[Myshkin57]

There's no reason they can't have motion detector lights.

[frantaylor]

Mummy can leave the night light on if you are afraid of the dark.

[RightWingMarine]

I'm not afraid, in my country I'm allowed to own a gun.

[ibsteve2u]

There ya go again, making a mess of my keyboard by causing me to spit coffee...

[sloreader]

Motion sensors would be a bust for them.

[Wilburrr]

Las Vegas needs a cell phone system that would allow anyone to turn the lights OFF.

[wdw505]

cause they just want to feel good that's all

[Tom95134]

Nice idea but what is the hidden cost of doing this? Is bulb replacement happening more often? What about the cost of the start up (which usually takes a lot of current to get high intensity lamps fires).

ANd finally, if you are going to be turning lights on and off, then why aren't you replacing these with high intensity LEDs and using solar power to charge a supply battery?

[KillTheMessenger]

"Is bulb replacement happening more often? What about the cost of the start up (which usually takes a lot of current to get high intensity lamps fires)."

No and no. Both are myths that have nothing to do with the engineering reality of street lighting.

"then why aren't you replacing these with high intensity LEDs and using solar power to charge a supply battery?"

Because that is a lot more expensive. But LEDs will indeed be the next logical step. I don't think that local battery storage is ever going to be competitive against power grid based solutions.

[Wilburrr]

Do you think that LED's would enable capacitors to replace batteries?

[ChuckFarley]

What do you think about putting windmills on them?

Well if we all had them new mini reactor nuclear power supplies, conservation and alternative energy technologies would not be as necessary. Of course it will be at least a decade before we see more then one or two in operation here in the U.S.