Benefits of led street lights resulted from trail projects

The Los Angeles project is of a piece with a larger shift to LED street lighting. On results from a global trial of LED street lighting in a dozen cities, led street lights are workable. The scope of the Los Angeles undertaking, combined with results recorded from the tens of thousands of LED units already deployed, should hasten other cities move to LEDs. Street lighting can account for up to 40% of a city’s electricity bill, according to Pike Research.

On January 23, the Los Angeles Bureau of Street Lighting published an update [PDF] on the status of the LED conversion project. The results: 114,067 units replaced, $5,325,793 in annual electricity savings, and 63.3% electricity savings over the incumbent high-pressure sodium (HPS) street lights.

Energy savings are real: At the outset, city planners estimated LED fixtures would achieve a 40% electricity savings over HPS units; as noted above, the actual savings is more than 63%. In 2008, Los Angeles spent $16 million for the electricity to run its street lights. When the LED retrofit is completed, annual electricity savings should reach $7.5 million. Other applications like LED garden lights are also energy saving. According to the city, the $57 million project, funded through a combination of energy rebates, the Street Lighting Assessment Fund, and a $40-million loan, will be repaid over seven years through electricity and maintenance savings alone.

Maintenance savings are real, too: In 2008, pre-LED roll-out, Los Angeles logged 70,000 street light repair and maintenance events; in FY 2012, maintenance and repair events fell to 46,300. LEDs are longer lived than the incumbent units they replace (10-15 years versus 4-6 years), which means that maintenance should steadily decline as LED units are fully deployed. A remote monitoring system, installed with the LED fixtures, indentifies problems in real time.