The city of Camas kicked off a project this month to replace more than 3,000 streetlights with LED bulbs.
The $3 million project will replace about 2,000 “cobra head” streetlights — the ones attached to an arm that hangs over streets — and about 1,100 “acorn” lights — the more decorative ones that typically sit on top of a pole — according to Steve Wall, Camas’ public works director, and add lights to Pacific Rim Boulevard. The cobra head lights are expected to be fully in place by mid-March, and the acorn lights, which are in more residential areas, will start switching over in late March or early April and continue through late spring or early summer.
The LED replacement part of the project will cost $2.3 million, with $500,000 awarded to the city from the Washington State Department of Commerce’s Energy Efficiency Grant Program. The rest of the money for the project will come from the city’s general obligation bond. Once the LED lights are in place and the energy savings are verified, the city can receive an estimated $240,000 Clark Public Utilities Energy Incentive, which would go to help pay debt service on the bond, Wall said.
“The overall benefit is the energy and maintenance savings,” Wall said. “The maintenance side is something that sometimes get overlooked. The long life of the bulbs helps a lot with savings.”
Wall said the city could see $97,000 per year in energy savings and an additional $8,000 per year in maintenance savings. The city’s current bulbs last around 24,000 hours, while the new LED bulbs have an average lifespan of more than 100,000 hours.
“Lighting is an excellent way to reduce energy costs in a hurry, and considering the cost of the equipment, (projects) probably pay off in a range of three to seven years simply from energy savings,” said Tom Stilz, program manager with the Washington State Department of Commerce. “That’s why it’s so attractive.”
Cities submitting projects for LED streetlights to the Energy Efficiency Grant Program are becoming more common, Stilz said. Applications for the next biennium of efficiency and solar grants from the Department of Commerce are due by March 3, and Stilz said he thinks the department will see upwards of 100 applications, maybe half of which the department will award funds to since it’s so competitive.
“The focus of the program is energy efficiency,” he said, though he noted that people feel LEDs improve the quality of lights.
Wall said that was another reason the city wanted to make the change to LED bulbs.
“It typically provides a brighter light quality,” he said. “It essentially illuminates the roads better. The distribution of the light is better, so it’s oriented more on the street and not necessarily in people’s yards.”
In the last set of grants, Camas was the only city in Clark County to get any of the more than $13 million in local government energy efficiency awards given out by the Commerce Department.
Ridgefield switch
In 2014, Ridgefield received a grant from the Washington State Transportation Improvement Board to replace about 350 streetlights with LED lights. Ridgefield Public Works Director Bryan Kast said the city also changed over about 50 residential lights to LEDs.
Ridgefield contracts its streetlights out to Clark Public Utilities, so the city pays a set fee for electricity and maintenance of each streetlight, Kast said, which Ridgefield is trying to renegotiate based on the savings from the LED lights. Kast said until the new contract is written up, he’s not sure the amount of savings the LED lights are bringing, but he’s heard positive things from residents and city officials want to switch over the rest of their streetlights.
Clark County Public Works spokesman Jeff Mize said the county doesn’t control a lot of streetlights, but years ago started changing all traffic signals and pedestrian crossing signs to LED lights. He said that nearly all of the county’s traffic signals and pedestrian crossings use LED lights, and the ones that don’t are in the process of changing over.
Most of the county road streetlights are operated by Clark Public Utilities, which has switched some lights to LEDs. A pilot project in 2014 replaced 50 streetlights in Battle Ground and 200 in Camas and Washougal with LED lights. Bill Hibbs, commercial programs manager with Clark Public Utilities and former street lighting specialist with the company’s engineering department, has been a longtime proponent of LED lights. He said advances in technology make it more worthwhile for cities to look into LED lights.
“As these products come down in price and increase in efficiency, it’s becoming a better and better payback all the time,” he said.
“LED is here. Two, three, four years ago, it used to be that LED was considered an emerging technology. It’s definitely here now.”
