KALISPELL — The City of Kalispell is working on a multi-phase project converting old high-pressure sodium streetlights into LED.
The project which started in 2017 has already converted more than 350 city owned metered lights.
City officials sid a little over a 100 streetlights, mainly in the downtown area will be fully converted by June of 2021.
Kalispell Public Works Director Susie Turner said a rebate through Flathead Electric's rebate program covers 30% of the project’s cost.
Turner added LED lights have an average life span of 5-10 years, reducing the frequency lights need to be changed.
She said three-person crews work on converting each streetlight to LED.
“We’re changing out the ballast, we’re re-plumbing or re-wiring so we can convert it to LED, so there’s a lot of really good in-house skill that we’ve utilized to help pay for some of this conversion,” said Turner.
Once fully converted, Turner said the LED lights will save the city roughly $12,000 a year in electricity bills.
