Garden Grove's Greener Street Lights

"Garden Grove is testing Greener Street Lights that will save money, and the planet." - CBS2 News at 11:00 O'Clock.

Save the Planet? The term is becoming so overly used, that its actual meaning is being lost in translation.

Will a bunch of L.E.D. street lights in a single city really "save the planet?"

No, of course not.

LED lights are highly efficient, and it is estimated by the city of Garden Grove that the use of the LED street lights will cut energy use by 30 percent to 60 percent. In the sense of saving the taxpayer's a few bucks, that is a good thing. With that kind of savings in energy, a switch over to LED lights just might be worth it.

But the switch isn't going to save the planet. Using that term is simply a way to make sure folks that have bought into the Man-made Global Warming Hysteria of mythical proportions are fully on board with the switch to LED. After all, the four 250-watt LED street lights that are going to switch over during this test don't come cheap. Regular street lights costs $300 a fixture, while LED lights cost about $2,000 a fixture.

Might as well use some "Climate Change will kill us all if we don't do something about it" magic to make the sell, right?

The upside is that the LED lights are constructed with 100 percent recycled aluminum, which means they contain no mercury or lead and do not require hazardous waste disposal handling.

I use an LED flashlight when I inspect my big rig in the early morning hours, and with a full charge in the battery, they are bright, and more than acceptable.

The downside is, when it comes to using LEDs in street lights, however, is that they are more expensive to install, and despite all of the rhetoric, they are not a factor in "the battle against climate change." We could eliminate the entire human carbon footprint, and the worldwide temperature would not change enough for us even to notice, because our contribution of greenhouse gases is so small, it has little effect on the environment - despite what the environmental alarmists may tell you. A less than one percent carbon contribution battle for a greener humanity is a moot point.

Congratulations to Garden Grove for possibly saving the taxpayer money somewhere down the road with these LED lights, but don't advertise it as "saving the planet," because in the end, that is a big, fat lie.

-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary

By Douglas V. Gibbs

Garden Grove tests LED street lights - Orange County Register, DEEPA BHARATH