Bristol City Council is upgrading its street lighting with ceramic metal halide lamps to reduce its annual street lighting costs by £920,000 per year.
The council has replaced around 8,000 existing high-pressure sodium street lights with GE Lighting's CMH StreetWise ceramic metal halide lamps and will, in the the next 18 months, replace 12,000 more lamps in the city's residential areas.
The local authority's energy costs at the start of the project were £2.53 million a year but by the end of the project this will fall to £1.94 million a year, a reduction of £590,000. However, taking into account rising energy prices, the council has said it will actually save £920,000 per year.
Energy usage prior to starting the programme was 23.5 million KWh. Energy usage for 2013/14 is expected to be 15.5 million KWh. The new lamps, fitted with standard E27/E40 bases, are installed in conjunction with dimmable ballasts to give the council the flexibility to dim the lamps (between 7pm and 6am) to a lower output when required.
Robbie Park, principal lighting officer for Bristol City Council said: "We are delighted with the street lighting upgrade to GE's CMH StreetWise ceramic metal halide lamps. Along with other energy reduction projects, financed with interest free loans from Salix, the overall result is astounding."
