Tallinn street lighting

Tourists or businessmen arriving in Tallinn either by ship or plane in the dark are pleasantly surprised by the good lighting of the city. The positive result arises from the fact that by now practically all the streets and roads, parks and verdant areas, church towers and many other architectural objects have received proper lighting. Last year, Russalka, the memorial to the shipwreck in 1893, was provided a new, historically suitable lighting solution.

Visitors do not, however, notice that KH Energia-Konsult Ltd, the company responsible for the maintenance of Tallinn street lighting, exchanged already 5 years ago all the mercurial lamps of Tallinn streets and roads that used to make up 30% of the total sum of the city's luminaries, for more economical, high pressure sodium lamps. The company replaced the conventional, local control system based on photo sensors, with a complex control system covering the whole city. Besides cost saving the latter system brought along also principal changes both in the outdoor lighting work and organization of labour. The control system:

1) switches on and off the street lighting of the whole city on the basis of a signal from a central photo sensor; switching on starts in the city centre and moves outwards, switching off takes place in the reverse order;
2) gives the street lighting operator information about the conditions of allcontrol-and switching devices, feeders and output lines, thus controlling voltage in more that 30 positions;
3) protects all switchboards and devices and given output lines from vandalism or other kinds of unauthorized action; in case of every unauthorized action a sound signal is given and it is instantly displayed at the operator's monitor;
4) enables authorized personnel to conduct control of devices and switches with the help of a registered mobile phone form whatever location.

The implementation of the unique control, monitoring, and safety system of street lighting has considerably improved the situation of Tallinn street lighting, saved a noticeably amount of money and reduced maintenance expenses.

by Mr Ain Valdmann