Villages in street light pilot (From South Wales Argus)

Villages in street light pilot

8:50am Saturday 11th April 2009

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THREE Monmouthshire villages have been chosen to pilot a street lighting scheme, which is being remotely controlled by the local authority from County Hall in Cwmbran.

120 lights in the villages of Trellech, Grosmont and Mathen are being used to test the scheme that uses mobile phone technology, with each individual lamp standard having the facility of being turned on or switched off at a flick of a switch or even dimmed down as required.

Roger Hoggins, the council's head of operations explained the lights are operated by a computer system at County Hall using a mobile phone signal, which transmits commands to a chosen lighting column.

From here the signal can then be relayed to up to 250 surrounding columns.

"A street light outside a pub could be programmed to stay on until midnight, or dimmed on a residential estate during the night," said Mr Hoggins.

"If there is a particular junction where traffic is a problem the lights could be brighter during the night," said Mr Hoggins.

"It gives us a level of flexibility," he added.

Dimming the lights by 50 percent in some places would show little difference to the naked eye, but would save the authority money in the long run.

The scheme is part of a feasibility study to look at ways of reducing energy costs by dimming street lights late at night and early in the morning.

Monmouthshire Council has a street light budget of £713,000, of which £360,000 is for its energy bill. If the technology is installed in all residential estates it would amount to a saving of £55,000 a year in energy costs. Roger Joy, senior engineer said: "While other authorities are switching off some of their street lighting, we decided to look for suitable alternatives to meet the communities concerns."

He added that the residents of Trellech wanted as little lighting as possible, while Mathen wanted the lights on all the time. With this new technology they are now able to deliver both requirements.

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