Gram panchayat approach road: 250W sodium to 100W LED street light
Gandhinagar district, Gujarat
A 2 km panchayat approach road on 9 m poles, running 250W high pressure sodium fittings that were failing every monsoon. Replaced with 100W LED street lights on the existing poles.
- Before 70,664 kWh/yr
- After 25,696 kWh/yr
- Saved 44,968 kWh/yr
- At ₹8/kWh ₹359,744/yr
The problem on site
Sodium vapour fittings were being replaced two or three at a time after every monsoon, mostly driver and ignitor failures from water ingress and unstable rural supply. The panchayat was paying for both the electricity and a recurring replacement bill, and stretches of the road sat dark for weeks between repairs.
What we specified
- Specified 100W rather than a like-for-like 250W: at 130 lm/W the LED head delivers comparable road surface lux to a 250W sodium lamp that has already depreciated
- Asymmetric optics so the distribution reaches 30 m spacing without raising wattage
- IP66 sealing and inbuilt surge protection, which is what the sodium fittings lacked
- Retained the existing poles and brackets, so the work was a fitting swap rather than a civil job
Outcome
Roughly 45,000 kWh a year off the panchayat bill on these figures. At the fixture cost alone the spend is recovered inside a lighting season; the larger gain is that a sealed, surge-protected head is not being replaced three times a year.