Long Beach will be making streetlights kinder to both the city’s budget and environment.
Over the next two years, city streetlamps will be retrofitted with LED lights that emit fewer carbon dioxide emissions and cost less to maintain.
An estimate from program directors anticipate an annual savings of $1 million in energy and maintenance costs once the lights are put in place, according to a press release Thursday.
Sponsored by the Los Angeles County Energy Network, an energy saving commission created in 2012, the streetlight revamp will take a little over a year to be fully completed.
The press release noted that the first phase of the re-installment would take two months and affect nearly 2,000 street lamps. The secondary phase will last throughout 2016 and complete work on over 24,000 lights.
The retrofit program is one in a series of attempts the city is making to create a more eco-friendly place to live.
“These LED streetlights showcase our commitment to environmental and fiscal responsibility, and will also provide better illumination, improving safety for drivers, bicyclists and pedestrians,” Long Beach City Mayor Robert Garcia said in a statement.
A Port of Long Beach Mitigation Grant for $659,000 is supporting the project alongside Southern California Edison.
“Our mitigation grants are an important part of showing our commitment to being the Green Port,” Board of Harbor Commissioners President Lori Ann Guzmán said in the press release.
The LED lights that will be used for the streetlights have a projected lifespan of about 24 years of life if used for 12 hours per day, according to the press release. The release also noted that projected lifetime savings for the retrofit are estimated at $15.1 million.
The city projects that it will fully recuperate all costs in the span of the next three years, according to the press release.