Solar street lights to be unveiled between Sandy Point and St. Paul’s on New Year’s Eve

Solar lights installed on the road to St. Paul’s and around the Robert L. Bradshaw Memorial Park (Photos by Erasmus Williams)

BASSETERRE, ST. KITTS, DECEMBER 28TH 2012 (CUOPM) – The Robert Llewellyn Bradshaw Memorial Park in St. Paul’s is the venue for the unveiling of the Solar Street Lights along the island’s main road between the communities of Sandy Point and St. Paul’s.

The Energy Department of the Ministry of Housing, Public Works, Energy and Public Utilities said the ceremony takes place on Monday 31st December 2012 at 5 p.m.

Some 120 lights are been installed in the area leading out of Sandy Point moving west towards the entrance of St. Paul’s and around the Robert Llewellyn Bradshaw Memorial Park – home of the life-size statue of the First National Hero.

The lighting programme, a partnership been the Federal Government of St. Kitts and Nevis and the Government of the Republic of China (Taiwan) is similar to the two along the Kim Collins Highway and the stretch of road leading from the round-a-bout at the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) to the Sugar’s Complex.

The bases are being constructed by employees of the Public Works Department. Installation is being supervised by the Taiwan company, Speedtech Energy.

General Manager Mr. Lucas Chiu said the 30W LED High Power Solar Street Lights are been installed.

“It’s a unique Cobra design. Its arm length can be adjusted in accordance with road width. The lamp pole is solid steel type and it can resist the wind speed up to 250km/h (rated 4-5 category in the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale). Our design meets the international product safety standard,” he told the Communications Unit in the Office of the Prime Minister (CUOPM).

He said that the aluminium pole is usually used for traditional AC street lamps and it’s not solid enough to support up to 100KG solar lamp head. Besides, 1m3 base construction can enhance the lamp’s resistance to hurricane force winds.

He disclosed that applying the “All in One” concept in the company’s solar lamp design, “we add solar panel, LED light, PCB controller and Battery altogether in one template and all of them are at the top.”

Mr. Chui said that his company’s design “reduces power transmission losses thru cables. Since solar panels convert the sunlight into electric current during the day time and the generated electricity is stored in a battery. Our design is trying to reduce power losses during transmission cable among solar module, battery, and LED light. Instead of installing a battery on the ground, we put it at the top (around 5m height). It can help prevent – ground heat problem as the heat from the reflected sunlight will reduce the lifetime of batteries -; batteries damaged by floods, theft problem of solar batteries, fast installation – our installation method is the fastest and leading in the world – and allows for easy maintenance with the changing of all the parts at the top.”

He also pointed out also that the anti-bird needle design can avoid birds’ droppings on solar panels which might reduce the solar power generation.

“Gel type batteries applied in our design can reduce the batteries’ inside liquid evaporation. It can make batteries’ lifetime longer. If there are continuous raining days, the Gel battery capacity can allow LED to lighten up for 3 nights (12-13 hours/night.) Besides, in the cloudy or rainy days, it still can charge batteries at 15-30%. There are also zero contamination and purely green energy. The stand-alone system has no more expense on electricity fee,” said the Speedtech Energy official.

Mr. Chiu also pointed out that the most appropriate solar lamp height is 6 meter.

“If the pole is higher, the LED’s luminance will be reduced on the ground. Besides, the more powerful LED lamp is applied. It will fail to meet the safety requirements for lightings, has anti-rust solution with special coating on the whole set of solar street lamps to ensure the best anti-corrosion effects,” said Mr. Chiu.