Hong Kong will soon replace its street lights with more energy-efficient
LED units, government officials confirmed.
The competent authority, Honk Kong Highways Department, on Wednesday said due to mature LED technology and the significant drop in prices of LED light, the department agrees now is the right time to commence LED street lights replacement scheme. It added that replacement work has already started in the current financial year.
(Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
Based on the life expectancy of existing street lights, the department will successively replace medium- and low-wattage high-pressure sodium lights with LEDs alongside roads, footpaths and cycle lanes. However, high-wattage sodium lights are excluded from this scheme because they still have advantages in terms of technology, quality, luminous efficiency and cost compared with their LED counterparts, the department said.
LED lights will also be installed on 4,500 gantry signs and roadside floodlights in the coming five years.
Since 2009, the Hong Kong government has launched trails of LED street lights in different places. The results showed LEDs performed better than existing sodium lamps in terms of energy efficiency, color rendering and reliability.
Besides, the trial on road sign lighting in 2015 saw LED lights produce a more uniform light, and use 70% less energy than existing floodlights. The trial on subway lights carried out in 2015 and 2016 yielded energy savings of 20% compared with conventional T8 fluorescent tubes.
In 2016, the cost of lighting the city’s streets using the existing sodium lights was HK$104.1 million (US$ 13.3 million), according to local media South China Morning Post.
CN
TW
EN
