„We need brightly lit streets to protect women from rape!” Really? Seriously?!? I’ve reached the point where I get angry – and I have some good arguments why we do not need so much light. I frequently get this statement. No matter how many arguments I have for the protection of insects, birds, hedgehogs or …
It’s always easy to complain if something is bad. However, there is only useful change when someone also has ideas how to make it better. Many communities want to have street lighting that combines cost efficiency, safety, climate protection, and comfortable light. But the actual outcomes of new street lightings are mostly quite sober. Last …
‘Let’s kill the moonlight!’ proclaimed the Italian poet Filippo Marinetti a few years after Edison’s incadescent lamp enchanted the world. With all our light pollution, we have been quite successful in doing this. And today, some people believe they can create an artificial moonlight. The light of a 4000 Kelvin LED street lamp, so some …
Everyday we move through our city, enwrapped in light. We are so used to this lightscape that we usually don’t think about how the light affects us or if we really need it. But this was exactly what I went out to do last week with 20 volunteers from social and ecological projects on a …
If you think of Berlin, you also think of night life. However, night life is not only fun, for many people it is hard work. To talk about all the work that goes into a successful nightlife, a conference has been held last week in Berlin. “Stadt nach Acht”, “City after Eight” had many topics …
Usually LEDs are installed because they are more efficient than traditional street lights. This means you get considerably more light for the same wattage. Andrej Mohar from Dark Sky Slowenia has an example of what happens, when this efficiency is underestimated. The light in the picture comes from a 4000 Kelvin LED street light with …