Innovative Solutions for Public Lighting in Smart Cities

Street lighting is a key service provided by public authorities at a local level. However, it represents a substantial share of energy consumption of about 50% in most European Municipalities.

LIFE-DIADEME project experimented an innovative smart system dedicated to public street lighting in urban environment for real time adaptive regulation of light flow, based on the surrounding brightness, traffic flows and weather conditions.

The consortium installed 1,000 DIADEME devices along the Test Sites in Rome, Piacenza and Rimini. The system collected information about traffic, luminance, weather conditions, temperature, air pressure and environmental noise. Moreover, specific devices were able to detect gas level concentration (NOX, NO, NO2, O3 and CO). Information was used by Municipalities to promote eco-friendly actions on their own territories through the creation of Dashboards, both for internal and external use, enabling innovative services for the community, targeting a Smart Cities scenario.

The main outcome of the LIFE-DIADEME system can be summarised in a reduction of energy consumptions and CO2 emissions of 40.6%, compared with Pre-Programmed LED installations and 55% compared with Full Light LED installations, reconciling the safety needs with the benefits of energy-saving and the reduction of CO2 emissions and maintenance costs.

LIFE-DIADEME System demonstrated, in the field, how Adaptive Lighting technology is a great opportunity in the direction of climate change mitigation.

Assuming that LIFE-DIADEME is installed in a medium city with 100,000 inhabitants and 12,500 lighting points, with the installation of 3,750 DIADEME devices, if we consider the average life of lighting fixtures, in 10 years we will have savings for 6,644 tonnes of CO2e compared with Full Light LED installations, or savings for 3,740 tonnes of CO2e compared with Pre-Programmed LED Systems.

A second example can show the impact of the LIFE-DIADEME system if installed in a big city with more than 200,000 lighting points as, for example, Rome City Capital (2.9 million inhabitants). In such a scenario, environmental savings would result in 40,000 tonnes of CO2e, 8 tonnes of PM2.5, 48,000 kg equivalent of Ozone and lower acidification, estimated near 95,000 MLC H+ equivalent. In both cases, the return on investment can be calculated in not more than 2,5 years.

LIFE-DIADEME was awarded with the prestigious «EU Sustainable Energy Award 2021» in the «Innovation» category. Read more here.