HOLDING THE LINE

HOLDING THE LINE

As the energy crisis continues to eat into local authority budgets, how can and should lighting professionals hold the line against demands simply to switch off public realm lighting? An expert panel at the ILP’s energy crisis event last month grappled with this challenging and complex question

By Nic Paton

Budgets are being slashed or, at best, frozen. At the same time energy prices show no sign of coming down anytime soon and, in fact, could be as high as 80p/KWh later this year compared to around 19p/KWh before the current crisis, adding millions to local authority lighting and energy bills.

‘We are all struggling. The pressure goes to you. “Make those cuts. Turn those lights off. Do some dimming. Do some trimming.” But where is our line as professionals?’

So questioned ILP President Fiona Horgan, opening what turned out to be a lively and informative panel debate that concluded the ILP’s special energy crisis event in Daventry, Northamptonshire last month.

The event, hosted by ILP Birmingham (and see the panel at the end for more on the day itself), was designed to bring the profession together; to try to unpick how the industry needs to respond to the intense pressure local authority lighting is now under because of the energy crisis sparked by the war in Ukraine.

A number of keynote presentations were followed by an audience-led Q&A panel discussion. This was chaired by Fiona Horgan and brought together APSE’s Mo Baines, ILP Technical Manager Guy Harding, WSP’s Allan Howard, Gary Kemp from the Department for Transport, David Lewis from Power Data Associates, the HEA’s Michael Levack, Alec Peachey from the Local Council Roads Innovation Group, and Karl Rourke, service manager street lighting at East Riding Council.

Fiona’s question went right to the heart of what is an intensely challenging issue for the whole profession right now. ‘For myself, and I talk to people about this, as professionals we need to come together, to be stronger, to hold the line,’ Fiona said.

‘It is an interesting point, about how we do manage to hold this line,’ agreed Allan Howard in response. The ‘line’, he agreed, needed to be something that could give lighting professionals the heft, clout and confidence to push back, to fight their corner. And, actually, perhaps the best organisation to give them this could be the ILP itself.

The energy crisis panel, from left: Gary Kemp, Allan Howard, Karl Rourke, Michael Levack, Mo Baines, David Lewis, Alec Peachey, and Guy Harding

ROLE FOR ILP

As Allan explained: ‘What they’re looking for is support from the ILP, or other bodies that have a reputation or a standing, to provide a letter, some evidence, back to them on appropriate ILP-headed paper or whatever, saying “we are the professional body, this is what the rules say”. That therefore then gives the local authority engineer some more defence and power, or whatever, to say, “look, this is wrong”.’

This could be, for example, providing the evidence to push back on, say, a sudden rush to solar as an alternative to conventional street lighting. ‘The ILP carries a lot of weight. It will help us convince them that what they’re looking at is wrong. Just because we might have solar lighting in the park doesn’t mean we can do it everywhere or on the roads. Because that’s what they think or that’s what some rep has told them,’ Allan added.

Karl Rourke agreed the ILP could have a crucial and important role to play in this. ‘I think the ILP itself carries a lot of weight; industry governing bodies themselves, regardless of what profession or industry you are working within, do always carry weight, particularly with politicians and policy-setters.

‘I have heard of colleagues who have made the policy-makers sign waivers of responsibility for the professionals within the department, to emphasise that it is the policy-maker making the decision and not the professional person.

‘But we have to be realistic. There will be some battles we can’t win. That ability to win that battle, as we progress in the next six, 12, 18 months is going to become harder and harder and harder. And we may have to concede. But we may have to concede with a professional objection. Where do we strike that balance? I’m not so sure,’ Karl added.

BATTLING BUDGETARY PRESSURES

How do we come together to provide that support, with our leaders and cabinet members, Fiona Horgan asked. How, as a collective, do we fight that budget pressure?

‘The reality is that we’ve already started to do that collaboration across local government, across organisations across the UK,’ said APSE’s Mo Baines, citing the ever-increasing closeness between organisations such as APSE, the HEA and the ILP, among others.

However, she added an important caveat. ‘As a voice, we do not have the collective recognition with the public that, say, the NHS has. We simply don’t have that collective voice within local government. And the lack of that collective voice has allowed us to be used as fair game for cuts.

‘We are consistently the worst off over all public services because there is no recognition; we do too many professional things. We do street lighting but we also do parks; we do our highways’ winter maintenance but we also do waste and recycling.

‘We perhaps need to have some kind of pledge card among all of those professional organisations within local government so that we are all rowing in the same direction and making a similar plea to the NHS.

‘Rather than have this disgraceful bidding – this beauty contest – for lumps of capital that aren’t supported by revenue, we collectively in local government across all provided services should be arguing for the basic needs to be met with needs-based budgeting. If needs-based budgeting is good enough for the police, if needs-based budgeting is good enough for the NHS, it is good enough for local councils,’ Mo added.

Was there therefore perhaps a need for a cross-industry campaign, Fiona Horgan asked.

‘It is not an if; we’ve got to do it,’ said the HEA’s Michael Levack. ‘Collaboration is easy to talk about; it is not easy to achieve. There is no silver bullet for all these challenges. However, are some of the answers in this room? Yes, they are. Because the manufacturers, the competition between them, the innovation that is there, is incredible, the passion. What the industry is doing from start to finish, from design to contracting to manufacturing, is incredible.

‘My advice would be to engage with your supply chain early, start talking to them. Say, “this is the really tough position we’re in, we’ve got to cut these budgets going forward, how can we do it without interfering on the real substance of what we’ve got?”. We’ve got to have that coherent message. And we’ve got to, quite frankly, get our skates on otherwise it is going to be too late,’ he added.

‘It is about being a bigger voice for all of us; we’ve got to be heard; we’ve got to be ones who are out there being listened to,’ agreed Fiona.

RETHINKING ENERGY PROCUREMENT

From the audience, Perry Hazell, ILP Junior Vice President and business manager at Southwark Council, highlighted that, at his council, they were looking at a 50% increase in energy prices from the end of this year, which could create as much as a £900,000 budgetary hole. Could one answer, he asked, be to move to a less fractured energy procurement process, even a single, countrywide energy procurement system?

‘We’re developing a dynamic purchasing system, which is currently in development at the moment,’ said Alec Peachey of The Local Council Roads Innovation Group. ‘I think the problem you’ve got here is a perfect storm, essentially, isn’t it. You’ve got rising energy costs, you’ve got inflationary costs, you’ve got supply chain issues.

‘I think in terms of the voice of the industry, always together we are stronger. For me, communication is absolutely key. Ultimately, we’ve got to deliver a consistent message and make sure that that is heard by central government.

‘And I always say that everyone is comms; it is not just the communications or marketing professionals within our respective organisations. It is every single one of you. We all have to deliver those key messages on a consistent basis to try and make the change happen. We all need to play our part. So, for me, that’s a very key point,’ he added.

‘As engineers, you can impact the KWh, you can’t impact the pence,’ agreed David Lewis of Power Data Associates. ‘You just have to take the blunt force of budget constraints, budget pressures.

‘When I used to work in local authorities, when we did do energy purchasing, we were members of a purchasing organisation. But what always triggered me was why were we doing it in area silos? Why weren’t we looking at it as a national impact?

‘Like Mo was saying, we are a nation, we’re all trying to do street lighting for one reason, the safety of our citizens and those who live in our areas. So, why aren’t we as a nation saying, “we should be counted as one; we should have an energy price as one”. I think this one voice should help us towards that. One voice between the organisations is where we need to be and where we need to be going,’ he added.

LOWERING LIGHTING LEVELS

What about the argument about whether lighting levels can simply be lowered? How should the industry respond to this, Fiona Horgan asked the panel.

‘I’m not going to sit here and say yes they are too high, yes they could be lowered,’ said Karl Rourke. ‘The lighting levels are in the standard for whatever reason they are in the standard, whatever research has been put behind it and so on.

‘What I will say is there is a clear distinction between lighting level and visual perception. The eye will see what it can see and will see it at certain levels. And the more you increase, it will not see more, it will continue to see what it sees, but you are increasing or decreasing the lighting level accordingly.

‘So, certainly one thing we’re looking to look at [in the East Riding decarbonisation pilot with Live Labs, see panel at the end] is we have these nice, standardised tables that we all have burning our brain. But, actually, is that appropriate for what the eye sees and for what the person perceives? And I’m not sure that that distinction has really been explored too much.

‘For example, take an average main street road and we apply 25% dimming to that. A lot of people in this room will apply dimming to their lighting, 25% between midnight and 5am. It is what we do in East Riding. I’ve stood there on the road and I’ve watched that light dim to 25%. Well, I think I have. I’ve stood there at the time it is supposed to do it; I’ve checked on my CMS that it did. I’ve checked on my light meter. But I haven’t noticed it’s dimmed.

‘So I would question there, well if my eye hasn’t noticed the difference between full power and 25% dimmed, then why does the standard say it needs to be at full power, when actually I can reduce it by 25% and still see the same I can see? I’m not going to stand here and say they are too bright. I’m not going to stand here and say they are too dark. Because it depends on your perspective. If you are a vulnerable single mother living in area of high crime and high drug dealing, you might stand there and say “my lighting is not bright enough”. So the lighting levels on the road are very, very much open to your own perception.

‘What we’re going to look at is a lot of the scientific basis behind that. We’re going to look at what the eye actually sees. And we’re going to do user case studies; we’re going to survey people. We’re going to take a user perspective as well as a scientific and medical perspective on this.

‘I don’t think it is a question you can actually answer in terms of the regs. The regs are what they are. They might change in a few years’ time, they might not. Whether that’s too bright or too dark, that depends on who you are really and what you are doing,’ Karl added.

‘They are also our one form of defence at the moment,’ highlighted Fiona Horgan, one of the industry’s key protections against liability.

‘With my CIE hat on, we have now got some projects running to look at the lighting levels that we will need, and a lot of it is looking at the age profile of people –because we have a much-ageing population globally,’ said Allan Howard.

‘The question is youngsters need a certain amount of light, older people perhaps need more light. So this research is going on,’ he added.

Would the British Standard then need to be changed if this distinction between lighting level and visual perception could be proven?

This was answered by Alistair Scott, chair of the BSI Technical Committee and non-executive director and chairman at DFL UK, who was in the audience. ‘The British Standards are purely guidance, and the important thing about using British Standards is to understand that lighting is such a complex subject that we would really welcome the research that is being done by Karl and the Live Labs team, and would like research like that to be inputted into future standards,’ he pointed out.

‘But the important thing is that every task should be looked at as an individual case and risk assessment done for that case. And the lighting professionals should decide what lighting level to use. The standards are not prescriptive; they are just guidance. I think it is important that every lighting engineer who is trying to reduce energy consumption looks at that and tries to work out whether they’ve got the right lighting level or can they reduce it,’ he added.

IMPACT OF SKILLS SHORTAGES

As the discussion drew to a close, Fiona asked the panel to consider how the industry’s skills shortages colour this question. ‘Who’s going to do this? We are all struggling for staff? How are we going to get the people in to do it?’ she asked.

‘The drive is necessity,’ said Michael Levack. ‘The necessity for a diverse workforce and more resources. Whilst energy prices are soaring and we’re focusing on budget cuts that are coming through, there are so many tales that I hear, literally on a daily basis, from client bodies, from local authorities, where people are saying, “that guy used to have a team of 12 and now it’s just me and one part-time assistant”.

‘That is totally unsustainable. That is where we have got to support local authorities. How we’re going to do it, I don’t know yet. But I tell you what we can’t do it by ourselves. We need more collaboration. If we work with the ILP, if we work with people in local authority street lighting to understand what you need – we just want people into the industry. Whether they go into the design office, to manufacturers, or a contractor or local authority, they are going to keep criss-crossing. We’ve all got a collective responsibility, and a desire I think, to make this sector more attractive,’ he added.

Alongside this was the fact that lighting, as a profession, has an ageing demographic, pointed out Fiona. ‘Go back to your local authority, look around your office and see what your age demographic is and are you leaving your local authority open for a future of no professionals when people go off into retirement? You’ve also lost the knowledge, competency and skills there.

‘We need to bring people in now to help with this future. We can’t deal with it if we haven’t got the staff to do it and the professionals and the knowledge base to progress further,’ she added in conclusion.

THE PANEL

• Mo Baines, chief executive, Association for Public Service Excellence

• Guy Harding, Technical Director, the ILP

• Fiona Horgan, ILP President and lighting design manager, The City of Doncaster Council (chair)

• Allan Howard, group technical director, lighting and energy solutions, WSP

• Gary Kemp, roads official, Department for Transport

• David Lewis, account manager, Power Data Associates

• Michael Levack, chief executive, Highway Electrical Association

• Alec Peachey, content director, The Local Council Roads Innovation Group

• Karl Rourke, service manager street lighting, traffic signals and CCTV, East Riding Council

Beverley, East Riding, North Yorkshire. East Riding will be piloting how to decarbonise its street lighting

EAST RIDING PILOT

As alluded to by Karl Rourke in the panel discussion, East Riding of Yorkshire Council is taking part in a pilot scheme to test and evaluate new technologies to decarbonise its street lighting network.

We will be looking at the pilot in more detail in next month’s edition of Lighting Journal but Karl, in his presentation to the energy crisis event, outlined how the scheme will aim to hold a mirror to the sector and, hopefully, help to develop an evidence base, a framework, for an alternative manual for highway lighting, signing and road marking.

‘Our aim is not to plunge the country into darkness, but to provide a well-researched basis to highway visual perception. In some areas, we may find that current standards don’t actually go far enough and streets could be safer and could work better if we increase illumination,’ he told ILP members.

‘We need to understand how the eye reacts and the distinction between light levels and visual perception. We need to understand contrast between wet roads and dry roads, summer nights and winter nights. A clear and robust methodology will support our final findings and provide a robust basis on which to defend the changes we make, ultimately in a court of law.

‘Our aim is to see the current 7.2 million lighting columns out there as peak saturation and provide an evidence base framework for a steady reduction in those numbers,’ he said, adding that he hoped the pilot would enable future highway design to place carbon reduction and energy use ‘as an equal priority to the visual environment we want to achieve’.

The pilot is one of seven announced by the Department for Transport in January, through the Live Labs 2: Decarbonising Local Roads competition, with £30m of funding being put behind them.

As well as the East Riding trial, pilots will look at the feasibility of producing asphalt made from green waste, such as grass cuttings. Others will evaluate changes to the design, construction and maintenance of typical UK highway construction, as well as creating a net carbon-negative model for green infrastructure delivery.

For example, Liverpool City Council will work to introduce an ‘Ecosystem of Things’. This will explore ‘a scalable and transferrable approach to understanding various systems (including design, public spaces, materials/process technology, recycling infrastructure and the legal, contractual and procurement processes) at city level to embed and adopt decarbonisation initiatives.’

Full details of the seven winners can be found on the Department for Transport website, https://www.gov.uk/government/ news/30-million-government-funding-for-innovative-projects-to-decarbonise-uk-highways

ILP ENERGY CRISIS EVENT

The ILP ‘Local authority lighting: energy crisis event’, hosted by ILP Birmingham, brought together ILP members from far and wide – from as far afield as Scotland and even internationally, from Canada – to discuss how the industry can, and must, respond to the energy crisis.

The well-attended event also saw manufacturers showcasing a range of solutions to the crisis.

Among the presentations – some of which will be picked up in future editions of Lighting Journal– WSP’s Allan Howard looked at the arguments lighting engineers can and should be making when asked by their authority to turn off streetlights.

The ILP’s Guy Harding gave a considered presentation on why sometimes solar lighting is not the right alternative solution in an energy crisis, and how to make that argument. Gary Kemp of the Department for Transport outlined some of the funding streams that are available for local authority lighting teams to tap into. David Lewis of Power Data Associates explained how it is imperative in the current crisis that lighting engineers are completely on top of their inventory.