In fact, there is nothing
future-tense about this fantastical vision; in a handful of
municipalities in Europe, streetlights have become downright chatty.
The system is called Tvilight. It was invented by Dutch designer Chintan Shah while a student at Delft University of Technology
in the Netherlands. When flying overseas, he noticed streetlamps
lighting streets that, in the middle of the night, were empty and
desolate.
Shah found that Europe
pays over €10 billion ($13 billion) a year powering streetlights, which
accounts for more than 40% of government energy bills.
This translates into 40
million tons of CO2 emissions annually -- enough to power 20 million
cars. His solution was to create an intelligent, "on-demand" lighting
system using wireless sensors. Streetlights only light up in the
presence of a person, bicycle or car, and remain dim the rest of the
time.
Shah has also developed
the technology to distinguish between people and smaller animals, like
cats and mice, so it would avoid lighting up unnecessarily.
