Blacktown City street lights ‘Light Years Ahead’

Published on 03 March 2021

Picture: (From left) Blacktown City Council’s Manager of Plant and Energy, John Bannister, Mayor Tony Bleasdale OAM, and Endeavour Energy’s Sal Barone at the site of one of the final LED street light installations in Kings Langley.  

Blacktown City Council, working in conjunction with Endeavour Energy, has just completed one of the largest residential street light upgrade programs in Australia, resulting in massive emissions reductions and cost savings for ratepayers.

Project ‘Light Years Ahead’ has seen the upgrading of 12,000 street lights to low-emission, cost-effective LED lights.

Mayor of Blacktown City, Tony Bleasdale OAM said; “LED street lighting is installed in all the recent developments in suburbs such as Marsden Park, Riverstone and Schofields.

“Our project has involved upgrading street lights in more than 20 established suburbs throughout Blacktown City.

“The massive reduction in emissions is a huge win for the environment and the cost savings is a great outcome for Council’s bottom line.”

The project has to date resulted in a cumulative street light cost saving to Council’s energy bill of $848,000 and over the projected 20-year life of these lights that total cost saving is expected to reach $8.5 million.

With the LED lights producing far less emissions, the project has resulted already in emissions savings of 2,750 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2), or the equivalent of removing 650 cars from our roads.

Over the 20-year shelf life of the lights, the cumulative emissions savings has been calculated at 68,000 tons of CO2 or the equivalent of removing 16,000 cars from our roads.

“In addition, the ‘Light Years Ahead’ street lights upgrade project was completed 6 months ahead of schedule providing additional savings in dollars and emissions,” Mayor Bleasdale said.

“In February last year, Council acknowledged that we are in a state of climate emergency and we committed to a series of measures to reduce the impact of climate change on our residents and achieve a zero-net emissions target by 2030 for Council’s operational electricity, fuel and gas use.

“Council has more than doubled its rooftop solar energy production by installing 1,800 solar panels across 16 sites.

“Council has set up a network of ‘heat refuges’ where vulnerable residents can shelter during extreme heatwaves and we are involved in a number of projects to reduce ‘urban heat’ such as massive tree planting and utilising ‘cooler’ road surfacing materials.”