LED light retrofit starting next week

Timmins residents will soon start noticing improved lighting along streets and roads.

Beginning on Monday, July 6th, installation crews will upgrade all of the City’s streetlights to light-emitting diode (LED) fixtures.

The project will initiate at the Lafleur Bridge and head westerly to eventually reach Riverside Drive. Over the next couple of weeks, the retrofit activity will primarily be performed on the entire Connecting Link.

The project will span a period of 4 months as roughly 4,000 street lights are being replaced. The new LEDs will help reduce Timmins’ streetlight energy costs by 66% and streetlight energy consumption by 66% after the first, while reducing CO2 emissions by 214 metric tonnes annually.

“Cost containment was key for the Municipality as we experienced significant hydro cost increases over the past years,” said Steven Black, Mayor for the City of Timmins.

“In addition to the energy savings, the Municipality will be reducing its maintenance costs by 80% as LEDs last four times longer than the existing street lights. The Municipality will also benefit from an IESO incentive of nearly $400,000 which will offset the total cost of the upgrade.”

The project was designed by Ontario’s Local Authority Services (LAS) and RealTerm Energy using new LED street lights from CREE Canada, one of the world’s leading LED manufacturers.

“Their LED Program provided industry expertise and analysis, which was something the City of Timmins did not have in-house,” confirmed Luc Duval, Director of Public Works and Engineering.

Timmins joins a trend of more than 125 municipalities in Ontario that have chosen to upgrade to LED street lighting with LAS and RealTerm Energy including Kapuskasing, Iroquois Falls and Cochrane.