Driving Innovation

Maywood Mayor Sees More Savings, Enhanced Safety with New Smart-Ready LED Streetlights

May 17, 2016
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Maywood Mayor Edweena Perkins looks forward to ComEd installing new smart-ready LED streetlights in her town.

Maywood Mayor Edweena Perkins looks forward to ComEd installing new smart-ready LED streetlights in her town.

For Edweena Perkins, the mayor of Maywood, a town of about 24,000 people 10 miles west of Chicago, saving $10,000 is no small matter, and she looks forward to that and a lot more benefits with new smart-ready LED streetlights from ComEd.

Maywood is one of the first of more than 50 Illinois municipalities selected to receive the new energy efficient light fixtures provided at no direct cost through ComEd’s Smart Ideas Energy Efficiency Program. About 18,000 will be installed in the ComEd service territory through the end of the year including about 380 in Maywood.  The new LEDs reduce energy usage, consuming only one-third the electricity of the fixtures they replace.

“In Maywood, we’re proud to be located in ComEd’s innovation corridor where the smart grid program was piloted back in 2009-10,” Mayor Perkins says.  “We were among the first to receive smart meters and we’ve really been looking forward to getting the new smart-ready LED lights.”

The benefits are clear, according to the Mayor.  For example, the monthly energy cost of the older 100 watt mercury vapor light fixtures was $1.71 versus 74 cents for the new LED equivalent. A bigger 400 watt light used in a park would cost $6.17 a month versus a new 145 watt LED with a monthly cost of $2.03.  “We’re very happy to save nearly $850 per month, that counts,” she says.

The potential for enhanced safety and security with the brighter, white lights is another important factor.   “The quality of light is much better than conventional fixtures and some of the new lights are being installed in alleys throughout our community where improved visibility is important to safety and security,” Mayor Perkins says.

The smart-ready LED streetlights open the door to an even broader range of potential benefits and functionality, but must be connected by way of a digital controller to ComEd’s smart grid wireless network. If the digital smart controller is installed, the smart-ready LED streetlights would automatically generate immediate notifications in the event that a lamp is in need of maintenance.  This would allow ComEd to promptly send the right crew, to the right place, with the right materials, without the need for customers to call in to report the issue.  This is good for public safety and enhances lighting maintenance efficiencies.

Remote control features further save energy and enhance safety by allowing the city to schedule the lights to dim at a safe minimum level or brighten for added safety or comfort.

“The electric system is playing a bigger and bigger role in the infrastructure of towns big and small,” says Mayor Perkins. “In Maywood, we like the enhancements ComEd’s smart technology is bringing and feel confident that it will only get better as technology evolves.”