23 April 2018

Canberra's streetlight network set for smarter and reliable upgrades

| Lachlan Roberts
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Light em’ up: ACT streetlights to get a smart upgrade.

80,000 streetlights across the ACT will start to be upgraded at the beginning of May under a new contract signed between the ACT Government and electrical company Electrix.

The contract will improve the maintenance, upgrade and power supply of the ACT’s streetlights in a seven-year partnership.

Minister for Transport and City Services Meegan Fitzharris said the deal will focus on keeping the lights on, getting energy efficient, and contributing to Canberra being a smart city.

Ms Fitzharris said the partnership was the first energy performance contract for streetlight services in Australia.

“A new digital control maintenance management system will be delivered as part of the upgrade to offer real-time monitoring of the network to automatically detect faults such as lamp failures or cable problems.”

The management contract will ensure broken lamps are replaced within two days instead of the current ten days, and will improve the energy efficiency of the network.

A significant proportion of the ACT’s streetlights will be upgraded as part of this new contract, delivering new LED lamps to streetlights in areas that currently have the oldest and most inefficient incandescent lights.

Electrix will work with its parent company Vinci Energies with a key focus on design and installation of energy efficient smart lighting technologies and related urban infrastructure for smart cities.

Minister Fitzharris said as part of the new contract Electrix will review the safety of streetlights.

“We want to ensure our streetlights are safe and working properly, but it’s important for the public to be aware and remember that electrical assets should be treated with care,” she said.

“The community should avoid coming into unnecessary contact with accessible Territory owned electrical assets, including streetlights or ActewAGL owned electrical assets such as power poles, substations and mini pillars as a precaution.”

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Can they put movement sensors on them, so they’re not burning all night long? Saves power and reduces light pollution.

Capital Retro10:40 am 24 Apr 18

Re powering them with “little solar panels on top”, the White Cockatoos have often wondered why that hasn’t been done either.

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