My Union Station

LED Use on a Grand Scale

I talked previously about using LED lighting in your home. Do you know what type of lighting is installed in traffic lights in your community? In most cases we still use a standard incandescent bulb.

The Department of Energy estimates there are 11 million traffic signals in the U.S. It is estimated that less than 10% use LED lighting. LED lighting saves an average of 85% over the standard incandescent bulb. If all of these signals were converted to LED replacements we'd be saving over 2.7 billion kWh (kilowatt hours) and $225 million per year.

Of course there are other benefits to this technology. Given the fact that the average traffic light bulb lasts only 12-15 months and the LED replacement can last up to 15 years you quickly get the idea that labor savings can be significant too. How about the reduction in fuel in the city vehicles sent to maintain these lights? What about the fact we can reduce the need to build a new power plant from the overall energy savings?

Is your city using these replacements? They should be and you should contact someone in the city administrators office to make sure you're doing your part.

Here's a link to a good article about a study done for western states.
http://www.westgov.org/wieb/led-lite3.htm

If your city government asked for help, be ready. Here is a link to information from Sylvania Lighting. Sylvania is one of several manufacturers of replacement LED lighting products.
http://www.sylvania.com/

What about all of the street lights in your city? There are far more street lights than traffic signals in every city. Your average street light uses about 100 watts of electricity. The average LED replacement lamp uses less than 20 watts. If you live in a large city you get the idea about how much energy we're talking about. Again, we can save money for the city, the taxpayer and reduce the need for building new power plants or the need to keep older plants on line.

While you're asking your city government about the traffic lights ask them about street light replacements. Here is a link to information about replacement lamps.

http://www.ledtronics.com/ds/SLT002/default.asp

posted by vjpfire @ 3:51 PM