For more than ten years, the municipality of Gräfelfing has been successively converting its street lighting to energy-saving and dimmable LED luminaires – whenever a road renovation is due. It deviated from this doctrine for the first time in 2019 in order to move faster, and also changed the lighting outside of the renovation program. Because it's worth it, as current figures show. Now Gräfelfing wants to take one last big step here, which could cost up to 300,000 euros.
Gräfelfing - Anyone who has always wondered how many street lights there are in Gräfelfing will now get a precise answer: There are 2269 burners, as it is called in technical jargon. Of these current 2269 luminaires, 1396 have already been converted to LED technology. This corresponds to 61 percent. "As a result, the electricity consumption of street lighting has been reduced from 741,124 kWh in 2014 to 381,988 kWh in 2022," Roland Strecker from the building authority has now informed the Committee on the Environment, Energy and Mobility (UEM). Thus, electricity consumption has been almost halved as a result of the measures. "According to Bayernwerk, a further reduction to 250,000 kWh per year would be possible with a complete conversion of street lighting to LED technology," says Strecker.
Dimmed down according to the timetable
These significant savings are not only due to the new, low-consumption technology itself, but also to the possibility of dimming these luminaires to different degrees in a specific timetable. "As a passer-by, you hardly notice it, but it results in a great saving effect," says Strecker. For example, the current dimming profile in Gräfelfing stipulates that the lamps will be reduced to 22 percent luminosity from 70 p.m., to 0 percent from 50 a.m., back to 5 a.m. between 6 a.m. and 70 a.m., when the first commuters are on their way, and to 6 percent from 100 a.m. until daylight.
Ulrike Tuchnitz (Greens) suggested in the committee meeting that the lights should be dimmed "even more". This was rejected by Mayor Peter Köstler, citing security concerns. In any case, Gräfelfing is already far ahead of other municipalities in the region. Municipal councillor Florian Ernstberger (BVGL) considered the Green proposal with the interjection: "The lights should also be lit, otherwise we don't need them."
Currently, there are still 16 streets in the municipality that have not been converted to LED and are not due for renovation in the near future. The municipality now wants to modernize all of these in 2024 in order to concentrate on the remaining streets in the following years in the course of the respective renovation and finally to be completely converted. The streets for 2024 are: Adalbert-Stifter-Platz (23 burners), Am Vogelherd (13), Asamstraße (14), Eichendorffplatz (8), Friedemann-Bach-Straße (21), Herbststraße (3), Himbselweg (20), Im Tann (6), Max-Bruch-Straße (9), Paul-Eipper-Weg (7), Planegger Straße (19), Schiffmannstraße (7), Steubstraße (6), Waldheimstraße (15), Weberhofstraße (8) and Würmstraße (20). The municipality estimates the cost of retrofitting the 199 burning points of these roads at "200,000 to 300,000 euros". The committee unanimously recommended this conversion to the municipal council for 2024.