Our follower city, Võru, is the first city in Estonia, and as far as we know, in the Baltics, where street lighting is 100% provided with energy-efficient LED lamps. During the last six years, the city of Võru has been working to ensure that street lighting throughout the city is modern, efficient to run and safe.
“The city of Võru has completed the complete modernization of street lighting, which has resulted in a significant increase in electricity savings, environmental sustainability and considerably improved traffic safety on pedestrian crossings,” commented Mayor Anti Allas.
According to Andres Visnapuu, the manager of OÜ Taristuhaldus, the company that manages street lighting in the city of Võru, there are a total of 2,428 lighting points in Võru today. “In recent years, 422 new lighting points have been added, and although street lighting points have been added, electricity consumption has decreased significantly. For example, 117,747 euros were spent on street lighting in 2014 and in 2019 the amount was only 68,282 euros,” Visnapuu commented, adding that if before the modernization there were only four lighted pedestrian crossings in Võru, today there are 104.
“Many thanks to us to the Environmental Investment Center (EIC), who has supported the modernization of street lighting,” said Visnapuu.
Under the leadership of the EIC, by the autumn of 2015, seven Estonian cities received new street lighting based on LED technology, which was considerably more energy and environmentally friendly than before. “This was a unique project, where in addition to the usual mediation and supervision of grant money, the EIC organized procurements for cities and was responsible for project management. One of these cities was also Võru, which at that time made its city whiter and more sustainable. Later, we have contributed from the structural funds to the modernization of street lighting in the city of Võru,” – says Andrus Treier, the head of EIC – “City street lighting works smarter and more economically.”
The last sodium lamp of the street lighting in the city of Võru was removed and replaced with a new LED lamp October 29, at 1 pm on Männiku Street.