WHO LEFT THE LIGHTS ON?

Lights

      Simple enough topic to be sure as in the bible God says, let there be light. I really don’t think it is quite as simple as that, and will impart with you a few thoughts I have had on that recently.  A friend of mine was living in New York and upon her first trip to Ohio was amazed at all the lights we had here. In fact I never really paid much attention to it till she said something. We were under lights almost the whole way from the Pennsylvania border till I ran out of them just below Akron but never more than a couple of minutes. Again I picked them up on I-77, north of Canton and was under them until I reached Krantz hill on 800 south of Canton. Dark to day light we pay for groundhogs to see when there are no cars. Wasted electric we feel is vital for our safety and protection. This is usually along main thoroughfares, but then when we are out in the country we have the same lights we depend on to drive in the city, only not as frequent and we usually have to pay for them.

        People in the city believe as well, as a bunch in the country believes we need lights to offer us protection from burglars and crime in general. Well that doesn’t seem to work very well as we still have crime regardless whether we have street lights or not. It is our fear of the dark we need the lights for, and for the power company to make money. Somebody has to pay for it and it allows the power company to grow and meet those demands. Whether it deters crime I am of the opinion that it does little but instead aide burglars and window peepers a better opportunity to evade those yard obstacles they might trip over. If it was dark enough for them to use flashlights then it would be easier to determine if someone was out there. My theory is turn off the lights till you need them. Solar path lights work well and the technology will improve as we go along.

     Street lights in bad intersections would still be ok if there isn’t enough light off a traffic signal to somewhat light the intersection. If it is real busy there will be plenty of cars there and no need for lights. So if you feel you still need lights at major intersections how about this thought? How about a motion activated light so that if a pedestrian or an automobile approaches the light will come on. Simple enough fix for lighting with proven results. If we could do away with 75 percent of our outdoor stand-alone lighting, just think how much that would save in terms of energy needed to produce all that lighting. In our area we use coal as we belong to American Electric Power for the most part and they generate the majority of their electric through the use of coal fired boilers. They like keeping the lights on and keep their boilers going as they can easily move from peak daytime hours into night generating power for lights. All this electric is contributing to global warming and it is starting right here at home. I doubt if any third world countries with limited resources are responsible for global warming, yet they are paying the price just the same as us for us keeping the lights on.

    I mean really if you are afraid of the dark, just stay home and turn off all lights unless you need them, another real saver. Install motion activated lights in those places you feel you need the security around you. The reason I am going into all of this about lights, is first, the effect it is having on our environment, and second, we are paying for street lighting that 60 – 90 percent of the time, no one is using. After all this I will inform you that although we have a light in the refrigerator, it is still more efficient than street lighting. When you shut the frig door the light does go off. I know for a fact as I used my camera with a time setting to see if it really does go off , and guess what it does and the system works. Outside the house where the refrigerator sits, it’s a different story.

    The time has come to look at our total energy usage and what resources we use to generate it. We have coal, nuclear, shale gas now, and solar and wind to a minor degree. The Department of Energy is looking at ways to improve electrical generation to meet our future needs,  and is fueling the idea with a 400 million dollar grant to develop a portable nuclear power plant coming soon to your back yard. Apparently the lessons learned from nuclear haven’t been enough to sway or eliminate nuclear as any option. Spent fuel storage and melt downs are now becoming more common than before and will in the long run with increased usage , be a larger problem. That 400 million would go a long way to reduce our electric usage by something just as simple as turning the lights off if we don’t need them.

beneficial reuse of concrete in a local's backyard. my hat is off to them 

      I at one time came up with an idea of using solar to light the edges of my driveway that could run only when you needed it as the placement of motion activated sensors would light section after section as you approach it and once you have passed would go dark again. Really the groundhogs don’t care if its light outside after all they are in a hole with no lights and when it gets dark they sleep. We know what lights do to deers, so this may be a more environmentally sound solution of using an alternative power source to light a driveway and with bigger grids could easily be used to light highways the same. LED’s provide enough light and are energy efficient when it comes to peripheral lighting. After all if it is dark enough we need our car lights on anyhow.  The same theory could be applied to our conventional lighting system saving the taxpayers huge amounts of money. We don’t have to study it, but know if no one is using the light and we turn it off, it saves money and we don’t need nuclear reactors for anything. We just have to work on coal and natural gas next,  and reduce our dependence on them.