The Quiet Revolution Of LED Lights

Cities across this country are switching from their old High Pressure Sodium (HPS) Lights to LED bulbs saving taxpayers $1,000,000 of dollars in the process. This is one of the least talked about “revolutions” in recent memory is the switch from (HPS) lighting to LED bulbs.

New York on October 23rd 2013 announced that it will replace all of its 250,000 street lights with LED fixtures. The lighting switch will save $70,000 and nearly 248,000 kilowatt-hours a year in energy. Keep in mind this is just for New York City, just think when the whole country switches over to LED bulbs. The New York replacement project… get ready for it… is expected to save $14 million a year in energy and maintenance costs!

Standard bulbs only last 6 years, but LED bulbs can last 20+ years further saving taxpayer money in equipment and labor costs replacing light bulbs. The replacement project in NY is expected to cost $76.5 million, but that really isn’t that much considering how much New York will end up saving. That works out to a cost of $306 per light bulb replaced.

The energy revolution continues in LA where the city will save $10,000,000 per year that’s $27,397/day in energy costs by switching to LED Bulbs throughout Los Angeles. The city will retrofit 140,000 street lights with energy efficient LED lamps.

In Anchorage it was published in Alaska Business Monthly on  01-AUG-09 that “Current LED technology provides between 50 percent and 60 percent cost savings through simple retrofits of existing HPS fixtures” and “…When combined with centralized control systems used to dim streetlights, depending on the weather and time of day, in some instances, studies show Anchorage energy savings approaching 75 percent over its HPS system.”

So once again I’m not quite sure why this revolution has been so quiet. LED Bulbs are fundamentally changing how much it costs to light up our city streets throughout this country and around the world.