New Streetlights - News - Federal Funds for Carmel, Indiana

Stimulus funds awarded to Carmel, Indiana

RFP expected within 60 days

Thursday, October 1, 2009

By New Streetlights staff

Now a confirmed recipient of federal energy efficiency stimulus funds, the city of Carmel, Indiana, is poised to take its first step in an ambitious effort to replace all its existing streetlights with LED streetlights.

Carmel was recently awarded $633,000 in federal economic stimulus funds to retrofit eight hundred existing street lights. Local officials are eager to begin soliciting responses through an open bidding process. Dave Huffman, director of the Carmel Street Department, noted that opening bidding for this project should begin within thirty to sixty days.

Carmel would eventually like to replace all 1,300 of its existing streetlights with the more energy efficient and cleaner burning LED luminaires. New construction along Keystone Avenue in Carmel already uses LED streetlights supplied by Tech Lite of Fishers, Indiana. In order to study energy efficiency, the city plans on metering a series of lights to test and analyze per light savings.

Although the city has not run a formal pilot project, they have been testing lights supplied by CM Buck and Tech Lite to calculate projected energy and cost savings. According to Huffman, “We have already seen energy consumption reduced by 406,508 KwH and CO2 emissions reduced by 557,119 lbs.”

In addition to cost and energy savings, Carmel sees the added benefit of streamlined procurement and management of replacement parts. By standardizing on one or two types of LED streetlights, Carmel will reduce the cost and complexity associated with managing the eight varieties of traditional lights they currently purchase and stock.

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