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Now that the clocks have gone back for the winter I have to make my way home from work in the dark. Well, not really. There is a newly completed office block on the way to the underground station which is almost entirely glass. It runs most of the length of one street and I noticed last night that it was like daylight down there. I looked back before turning the corner and saw that although there were a number of street lights, they were not on. Now, that could be because the power had not been reconnected after the recent building work (finishing touches are still going on) or it may be that there is so much light escaping from the new offices that
the little sensor on the street lights keeps them turned off. The building looks nice and it is no doubt safer for public areas to be brightly lit at night but too much light is a form of pollution.
As a boy I was very interested in astronomy and would spend hours in the garden looking at the sky. In those days we lived about 8 miles from central London and it was possible to see very many stars on a dark night. Now thought, we live about twice the distance from the city and I can count the number of stars that I can see with the naked eye. Aircraft passing overhead used to be defined by the flashing lights on their wingtips and under body. Now they are lit up by the reflected street lighting almost as if caught in a spot light.
As a boy I was very interested in astronomy and would spend hours in the garden looking at the sky. In those days we lived about 8 miles from central London and it was possible to see very many stars on a dark night. Now thought, we live about twice the distance from the city and I can count the number of stars that I can see with the naked eye. Aircraft passing overhead used to be defined by the flashing lights on their wingtips and under body. Now they are lit up by the reflected street lighting almost as if caught in a spot light.
There is too much light being projected upwards and it is getting worse. Opposite my house is a street light. When we moved in it was a mercury lamp giving off a cool blue-white light. It had a metal lid which reflected light back down to the ground. Then it was replaced by the more familiar sodium lamp which gives off a yellow colour – better, I believe, for penetrating fog. That was okay up until a year or so ago when it was replaced by a whole new structure with a much more efficient bulb which I can only guess works on some sort of thermo nuclear principle. It is also angled so that the front of our house is bathed in orange light – great to deter burglars but it also lights up the front bedrooms.
Yes, this is me with my telescope aged about 14
The amount of energy wasted on unnecessary lighting must be phenomenal, not just in this country but all over the world. You only have to look at satellite photos of densely populated areas of earth at night to see how much escapes upwards. It would be good if we could cut down on the unnecessary stuff like the current trend for floodlighting public buildings. Sure, it looks nice but I for one would much rather be able to see the stars.
Here's an example I found locally