Sydney blackout. why not Singapore too?

kingkong · Post by **kingkong** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 9:20 am

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/0 ... index.html

switch off those lights, in the name of saving energy and combating global warming, and seeing more stars!

Post by **Airconvent** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 11:18 am

Singapore is trying to light up to promote tourism. Did you see the pictures of their concepts? All had spot lights pointing UPWARDS!
In sydney, the sky is still ok, so they can work to preserve it. ours is so bad, alot of effort will be needed to improve it..non of them economically viable....

kingkong · Post by **kingkong** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 8:53 pm

i don't understand how stopping spotlights from pointing upwards is economically not viable.
if we, the educated and supposedly enlightened, succumb to the myths that what's good for the environment is necessarily bad for business, or things is so bad nothing can be done now, or global warming is exaggeration, or providing clean air and clean water are the jobs of the less developed; then indeed we are doomed.

Fuzzball · Post by **Fuzzball** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 11:24 pm

I was wondering if there is anything practical we can do to save our skies. We have talk about this topic of dark skies/bad lighting in the forum in quite a few posting.

Is there a way we can plan a strategy to do something about it?

Some things I can think of:

1)We can write into the forum in Straight times consistently to get some attention to this problem. We can get a authority or somebody that represent our Singastro to write a letter in.

2) We can write to some MP to get their attention that its not just about dark skies for astronomy, but its about energy saving, environment saving etc.

3)In conjunction with making Singapore green ( a garden city) roof tops are being open with gardens, can we suggest with greening we can also put up appropriate lighting or turn off the light at a certain time to allow citizen to enjoy the skies.

4) Can we work with TASOS to strategised on how to attack this problem? I know that they have periodic discussion with IDA. Can we tap on that?

Last week, I brought 40 of my church friends to the Science Center observatory to observe the skies and stars. So many people are interested in Astronomy! But you know what because of our night sky, high cloud cover, we can only see the moon and venus.

I used to stay around Holland Village when I was a kid (in the 70s)the skies was so beautiful then you can see so many stars in the skies. I remember the place (Ford Avenue) I was staying was pitch black at night and the only light that shine was the stars and after watching "Battlestar Galactica" I would look up and imagine how great it is to travel in space from stars to stars...Question is will our children have such great memories and imagination? or will it be pollution, blazing lights that clutter our nights instead of pristine skies?

Its time we do something about it or we are fighting a losing battle.

Post by **Airconvent** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 11:35 pm

kingkong wrote:i don't understand how stopping spotlights from pointing upwards is economically not viable.
if we, the educated and supposedly enlightened, succumb to the myths that what's good for the environment is necessarily bad for business, or things is so bad nothing can be done now, or global warming is exaggeration, or providing clean air and clean water are the jobs of the less developed; then indeed we are doomed.

It is. The government is trying to create a vibrant city with good night life similar to that in Hong Kong to promote tourism and night entertainment industry. To do this, its master plan calls for lighting up of the night sky. Ironically, Hong Kong is now calling this a waste of energy and trying to cut down!
To cut the lighting, they will have to replace many existing lightings too. Not something they can do quickly but probably over 10 years or so, assuming they decide to start now. I think the issue is priority. Clear sky is simply not anywhere in the authority's road map now unless you are talking about the haze! Even the lights in parks point sides ways. I find them very irritatingly glaring. The reason why they don't point downwards is because of security concerns with crime...Then there is those super duper bright non-factory headlights from cars!
Also, pollution is another problem. If there are no clouds and smog, even light shining upwards will have no medium to reflect back on us...so I guess the government needs to take greater steps (they started with very small ones now...) in environmental management.
Of course, Singapore is but a tiny dot. Concerted efforts have to come also from our neighbours also, otherwise it would be meaningless...but except for astronomers, who in this region are worried about dark skies? ... :roll:

jennifer1611991 · Post by **jennifer1611991** » Wed Apr 04, 2007 5:34 pm

I just think that there's a reason why the only natural lights in the sky are stars and the moon..

yanyewkay · Post by **yanyewkay** » Wed Apr 04, 2007 5:41 pm

I think I ever read a letter to the ST forum about lights and waste of power (gov't is even giving out incentives for lighting up the buildings at night) The writer even said that the bright lights shining up may mislead migratory birds as well.

Well, as with all gov't decisions, are all final. No correspondences will be entertained.

madsock · Post by **madsock** » Wed Apr 04, 2007 11:40 pm

Not that i am promoting light pollution, but having a well lit city will sort of promote that crime rate be low, city is safe, drivers can see the road... etc. Basically good things we are enjoying right now.

Although having the lights point UPWARDS does not make any sense.

but talking about light pollution, as long as there is a lousy street lamp in the vacinity, your stargazing chances are sort of ruined.

sigh.... so we'll go to johor to look at stars....

Post by **Airconvent** » Wed Apr 04, 2007 11:47 pm

madsock wrote:Not that i am promoting light pollution, but having a well lit city will sort of promote that crime rate be low, city is safe, drivers can see the road... etc. Basically good things we are enjoying right now.

Although having the lights point UPWARDS does not make any sense.

but talking about light pollution, as long as there is a lousy street lamp in the vacinity, your stargazing chances are sort of ruined.

sigh.... so we'll go to johor to look at stars....

for your info, johor is joining singapore soon as they are also building up rapidly. mersing is no longer as dark as it was several years ago and the skyglow is quite irritating now, not to mention another sky glow developing in the opp direction....sigh...

Post by **VinSnr** » Thu Apr 05, 2007 3:03 pm

madsock wrote:Not that i am promoting light pollution, but having a well lit city will sort of promote that crime rate be low, city is safe, drivers can see the road... etc. Basically good things we are enjoying right now.

Although having the lights point UPWARDS does not make any sense.

but talking about light pollution, as long as there is a lousy street lamp in the vacinity, your stargazing chances are sort of ruined.

sigh.... so we'll go to johor to look at stars....

actually our current use of lights is not efficient. Let's take a street lamp for example. Only 60% of the light shine downwards illuminating the road, but 40% shine upwards for nothing except polluting the sky.

In some part of US, they started to use a different light design (light bulbs and the shade) where 90% of the light shine downwards and only 10% is wasted elsewhere. That makes more sense and getting better value for the money.