GALWAY CITY COUNCIL PUBLIC LIGHTING PROGRAMME

Galway City Council is progressing a range of initiatives to engage the public and support behaviour change in favour of Climate Action. Initiatives currently underway range across areas including transport, energy, biodiversity, housing and waste – with some focusing on technological solutions to emissions, and others focusing on community engagement, environmental awareness, or prompting behaviour change. Some recent highlights are summarised in this article, with all forming part of Galway City Council core policies and strategies, including the Galway City Climate Adaptation Strategy, the City Development Plan, and the Galway Transport Strategy, among others.

Galway City Council Public Lighting Programme

Galway City Council has been very proactive in relation to the management of public lighting assets, as part of a commitment to climate action.

Public lighting accounts for 50% of Local Authority Energy use. Galway City Council has over 9,500 public lights in the city, with over 80% high energy burners sodium lanterns as of January 2020.

Public lighting was targeted for an accelerated retrofit to energy efficient LED lighting, through a planned programme with a budget of just over €4M.

As of August 2022, the retrofit is substantially complete with over 95% of public lights retrofitted to LED. The retrofit has resulted in:

• Average 64% energy savings • Energy costs reduced by €340,000 per year • CO2 emissions reduced by 975 tonnes per year and • Reduced yearly maintenance costs.

The accelerated retrofit programme will have a payback of 9 years, making strong economic sense; providing enhanced public lighting; and making a positive contribution to the environment and climate action. The LED programme has included upgrades to 20 walkways around the city, to support permeability/walking and cycling, and reduce anti-social activities.

One such initiative was the coastal walk beyond Blackrock, and at Southpark, close to the Prom in Salthill. Despite the popular location for walking, cycling, sea swimming and tourism, these sections of walkway were unlit, and got very little use during winter months.

Through NTA funding, the routes were upgraded to promote active travel.

Both walkways are along the Galway Bay coastline, and as the bay is a Special Area of Conservation (SAC), any lighting should have no negative effects on the environment.

Galway City Council, with Public Lighting Contractor Electric Skyline Ltd and Urbis Schréder, a worldwide outdoor lighting solutions provider, collaborated to create a connected smart lighting solution.

The challenge was to find a smart, lowcarbon solution that would enhance the areaʼs character, respect the sensitive environment, protect the coastal views of Galway Bay, and facilitate walking and cycling in the area.

The solution was to provide a lighting system that minimised light spill up into the sky, as well as in natural habitats. The product that was installed were 1.5m high PHAROS bollards with Flexia luminaire lanterns. This is the first installation in Ireland, and the largest in Europe. The lighting automatically comes on just before dusk and goes off at midnight.

Another attractive feature is that the light levels can be varied. With high spring tides, the area is prone to flooding, and if there is an incident, more light will be beneficial. In the event of an emergency, all the luminaires can be turned up to maximum.

The feedback from local Councillors and the public has been very positive. One local resident and regular user of the prom said “The lighting gently illuminates the walkway without being too bright” and noted that the amount of walkers and bikers has increased.

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