Lighting the Way for Big Energy Savings in Los Angeles

The world’s largest light emitting diode (LED) conversion project to date is under way in Los Angeles, California.

In the project’s first phase alone, the city retrofitted over 141,000 streetlights, reducing energy use by 63% and saving the city $7 million a year in electricity costs. The project is expected to reduce carbon emissions by 47,583 metric tons annually, which is equivalent to removing about 10,000 cars from Los Angeles roadways per year.

Lessons learned from this project were discussed during the Energy Department’s (DOE) Municipal Solid-State Street Lighting Consortium (MSSLC) webinar in September. More than 560 attendees gained insight from Ed Ebrahimian, director of Los Angeles’ Bureau of Street Lighting. To date, more than 370 municipalities, utilities, and government agencies have signed on as primary members of MSSLC.

The consortium has been instrumental in developing model specifications and other tools to enable informed decision-making about municipal lighting options.  Learn more about MSSLC.

SSL has the potential to reduce U.S. lighting energy usage by nearly one half and contribute significantly to our nation's climate change solutions. Learn more about what DOE is doing to advance SSL technology.