Udupi Town to become first Sodium, Metal-Halide Street Light free town in Karnataka

PTI

Udupi, 10 Mar 2017: Udupi is expected to be Sodium, Metal-Halide street light free town in Karnataka as Udupi City Municipal Council is planning to make Udupi as Sodium, Metal-Halide street light free town by replacing them with other suitable alternatives in an attempt to cut down electricity consumption and save expenditure on street lights being spent in the Udupi town area limits amid hot summer and power shortage.

 

A decline in electricity consumption could support to meet power demand in the town especially peak hours during summer season. According to the plan proposed, all sodium, Metal-Halide street lamps are expected to be replaced by June 2017 with LED lamps. For the time being, 15, 607 street lights are illuminating the town out of which 12457 lights are florescent tube lights followed by 286 CFL lamps, 1215 LEDs, 286 Metal-Halides and 1363 sodium vapor lamps.

 

According to the Municipal Council engineer, Shashidhar Hegde, single sodium vapor lamp consumes single unit electricity for illuminating its surroundings. Based on this, every day 1363 sodium vapor lamps illuminate the area consuming 3 units of electricity. Also, around 4089 electricity units are being consumed by these lights followed by 48, 000 units of electricity in 12 months.

 

Rs 6 crore are being utilised for street lights in Udupi. If sodium, metal-halide street lamps replaced with LEDs then it could help the municipal council to save at least Rs 2 lakh per month.

 

For the time-being, 13216 electric poles are located in Udupi. There are 279 sodium lamps of 70 watts, 402 sodium lamps of 150 watt and 352 Sodium lamps of 250 watt are illuminating Udupi town on daily basis. Also, 302 LEDs of 24 watt and 703 LEDs of 72 watt are functioning in the town.