Leafnut helps local authorities across the UK achieve 40 per cent cuts in street lighting energy costs

(14/01/2009)

The Leafnut system is the result of a six-year research and development programme at Harvard Engineering. It also cuts carbon production and toxic waste by upto 50 % across the whole street lighting infrastructure. Producing savings of 100kg of carbon emissions per lighting column per year, it is easy to install and commission in new or existing lighting schemes.

The system provides monitoring, switching and dimming control of each street light, revolutionising maintenance programmes by providing individual lamp fault reports. Streetlights are controlled via a webserver and are programmed to vary their light level to correspond with traffic and population density. In this way lights can be dimmed during the night when they don’t need to be run at full power or turned up during special events such as football matches or closing times.

Accurate inventory information is also provided to the street lighting managers who can plan maintenance schedules as they can identify failed lamps and even predict when lamps will fail by using the monitoring data that the system provides.

Local authorities across the UK can achieved 40% cuts in street lighting energy costs. Harvard financial director Martin Baum believes the innovative company’s latest product has a tremendous future: “Basically, it provides a two-way conversation with each street light, logging whether it’s on or off, how long it’s been running and useful life remaining. Each light can be controlled at varying power levels and there’s also an emergency button. Clearly there are also additional financial and carbon footprint savings in not having to despatch staff in transport to check lights.

“One town in Holland uses the system to increase public lighting on Friday and Saturday and Warrington in Cheshire is 100% committed to LeafNut. Westminster Council is about to complete a 12-month trial and three sites in Sheffield are currently on trial. Before going public, we tested the system exhaustively on our own business park in Leeds – where it is still operational.”

Cllr Andrew Carter, Leeds City Council's executive member for development said: "Harvard Engineering epitomises the mix of enterprise and innovation so characteristic of Leeds manufacturing companies. The combination of growth, investment in research and development and the launch of a market-leading new product range points to a bright future for the company and its workforce."

Related categories:  Energy efficiency   Lighting control system   Office and commercial