A switch to cost-saving LED streetlights has saved Hawaii County enough money to pay for upgrades to traffic signals islandwide.
Ronald Thiel, chief of the traffic division at the Hawaii County Department of Public Works, said workers began switching to LED streetlights in 2012, when the first 1,000 were installed.
LEDs produce about as much light as old low-sodium bulbs. But LEDs burn at lower watt levels, thus using less power.
Thiel said Public Works was spending about $2 million per year for electricity but now spends approximately $1 million, thanks to the lower-cost lights.
The money saved, he said, has “allowed me to start upgrading our (traffic) signal system.”
There are about 105 intersections with traffic signals islandwide, Thiel said.
“We’re starting to move toward ITS: intelligent transportation systems,” he said. “Now, we will be able to monitor all of our signals from our management control center.”
If a malfunction happens at an intersection controlled by traffic signals, the malfunction will show up electronically at the control center.
If a hypothetical lightning storm disrupts a traffic signal at a particular intersection, for example, county staff will be able to intervene faster once the upgrades are complete. That, Thiel said, also will improve safety for motorists because traffic signals will go back online faster after a malfunction.
“All we have to do is push a reset button on our panel, and it resets,” he said.
Staff will be able to check to make sure traffic is flowing smoothly. Before, workers had to go directly to the malfunctioning traffic signal and push the reset button there.
Video cameras at traffic signals, Thiel said, will be used, once upgrades are complete, to verify a signal reset happened properly and that traffic flow has returned to normal. Nobody will sit in a room and monitor video screens.
Rather, workers will turn the cameras on for short time periods to check for traffic-flow resumption or to verify a malfunction was corrected.
The effort to switch to all LEDs went full steam in 2015 when workers began replacing all remaining streetlights islandwide with LEDs. The effort was completed at the end of 2016.
“We went through the whole 10,500-light inventory and changed everything out,” Thiel said.
Hawaii Electric Light Co. spokeswoman Rhea Lee-Moku said residents can switch to LED lights and save energy — and money — on a smaller but similar scale to the county.
She advised reading the bulb packaging, looking for lower-watt bulbs (LED bulbs can have single-digit wattages) and making sure the packages say LED.
“It’s a significant savings when you go to LEDs,” Lee-Moku said.
Email Jeff Hansel at jhansel@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
