Brendan Griffin (Kerry, Fine Gael)
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171. To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources further to previous parliamentary question the reason for the delay in replacing existing local authority public lighting sodium lamps with high efficiency LED units to reduce energy consumption and maintenance costs (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter. [33234/16]

Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent)
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Further to my reply to the Deputy in April, I am pleased to report that progress on this issue continues to be made through the National Public Lighting Steering Group. This group is chaired by the City and County Managers Association (CCMA) and includes representatives from Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII), the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI), the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport and my Department.

Preparation for the physical upgrading of public lighting assets is underway across a number of work-streams. It is necessary to have a standardised and up to date inventory of these assets, and I understand Local Authorities are well advanced on this task. Good progress has also been made on the critical issue of the technical specifications for these upgrades by the CCMA, TII and ESB Networks. This work is allowing the CCMA to proceed with designing a national procurement of energy efficiency upgrades.

The action to which the Deputy refers was part of an earlier, exploratory, phase of the strategy to upgrade public lighting.  The strategy has now evolved from this regional project to a coordinated national approach. Such an approach is necessary to develop optimal technical solutions, achieve economies of scale in procurement and ensure that, as one of the largest users of energy in the public sector, Local Authorities make their contribution to the achievement of the target on the public sector to improve its energy efficiency by 33% by 2020.