L.A. Mayor meets with Clinton on city light plan

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who served as national co-chairman of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s presidential campaign, is scheduled to appear Monday at city hall with former President Clinton to announce a five-year project with the Clinton Climate Initiative to make the city’s street lights more energy efficient.

The mayor’s office said the plan to swap out all of 140,000 of LA’s residential street lights with more energy efficient LED lights would be the largest program of its kind undertaken by a city.

While normal street lamps last four to six years, the LED lights can last as long as 10 years — which officials hope could save $48 million over seven years. The switch is also expected to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 40,500 tons each year, which the mayor’s office said would amount to taking 6,700 cars off the street.

The Clinton Climate Initiative, which falls under the umbrella of the former president’s foundation, was launched in 2006 to work with cities and private companies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

In New York, the group recently joined with the housing authority to install 10,000 fluorescent lightbulbs at one of the largest housing developments in the country.

-- Maeve Reston

Comments

[Peter greenberg]

Led streetlighta are the least cost effective of any type of
Energy efficient lighting. Indoor lighting retro fits should all come first
T12 to t8 I'm all city and school buildings, metal halide to t5h0 in school gyms.
Exit signs to t8, incandescent to cfl.
then street lights to fluorescent is more coat effective to led.
If the led screws up in 4 years and the manufacturer is out of business
Than you are stuck with expensive boxes.
How much do led circuit boards and drivers cost to replace!
Flurescent street lights with new lamps at 100,000 hrs make much
More sense than led.

Thanks

[Bill]

Lets finish the traffic signal improvements before we charge off in a new direction replacing street lights. We need more left turn lanes and adaptive signal control systems. Every car stuck in traffic adds a lot more pollution and frustration than any streetlight upgrade could ever save.