Issue - meetings

This report provides an overview regarding South Kesteven District Council’s potential to upgrade District Council operated streetlights to energy efficient LED units.

Purpose of report

An overview regarding South Kesteven District Council’s potential to upgrade District Council operated streetlights to energy efficient LED (Light Emitting Diode) units.

Decision

1.     Cabinet recommended to Council the allocation of funding of £1 million to accelerate the replacement of the Council operated streetlights with LED energy efficiency lamps. The scheme to be funded as follows:

o   £500k Invest to Save Reserve

o   £250k Budget Stabilisation Reserve

o   £250k Local Priorities Reserve

2.    Cabinet requested that Environment Overview and Scrutiny Committee review the current Street Lighting Policy with regard to further reducing energy costs at specific times and locations.

Alternative options considered and rejected

Option 1: Accelerate programme to upgrade all existing lights to LED. Indicative costs were obtained to upgrade all possible streetlight units to LED within a year of contract commencement. This included an allocation for the potential upgrade of obsolete street light columns where required, estimated at 5% of the total stock of lights. A dimming schedule between midnight and 6am was assumed, where lights were dimmed to 50% of full illumination, in line with current policy. An overall energy saving by upgrading to LED with 6 hours of dimming of 63% was assumed based on supplier projections.

Option 2: Accelerate programme to upgrade all existing lights to LED and implement policy to switch off lighting between midnight to 6am. This option used the same assumptions as Option 1, but rather than using the existing dimming profile assumed streetlights would be dark between midnight and 6am, with an assumed energy saving of 75%.

Option 3: Review provision of streetlighting with the aim to upgrade every other unit to LED and decommission remaining units. The potential to reduce the overall stock of streetlights which the Council had the responsibility to illuminate had also been explored.

Regarding option 3, consideration would need to be made on the placement of individual lamps to ensure the remaining provision of lighting was adequate around decommissioned columns. Once agreed, the Council would need to remove fuses from streetlights to be decommissioned at a cost per lamp. The lamps would remain liable for a standing charge for electricity when not in use. Once the light was declared as obsolete, the Council was obliged by the National Grid to potentially disconnect and remove lighting columns after a 2-year period, at a further cost. The Council also had a duty of care to ensure the obsolete lighting column was inspected annually to ensure they remained safe. Finally, adequate signage would need to be added to every lighting column decommissioned, to help minimise the number of reports to the Council of faulty lights. Given the number of impediments to decommissioning and removing lamps, detailed costs had not been provided to Cabinet.

Option 4: The Council could choose not to pursue a proactive programme of LED upgrades. This would require no upfront investment and lamps would only be replaced by LED when a streetlight has failed. This would mean a significantly longer programme of replacement  ...  view the full minutes text for item 24