For the sake of applying the new energy and making the street lighting available to remote areas, the street lights keep developing. Solar street lights are the new trend, and later people developed all-in-one solar street lights. Traditional LED street lights have a cheap price; solar street lights can save energy; and all-in-one solar street lights can additionally save on installation costs. Then which one on earth is the most economically friendly street light? In this passage, we will compare the solar street light price and costs of installation, electricity, and maintenance for these three types of lights. Let’s get to it!
Introduction of traditional, solar, and all-in-one solar street lights
Traditional street lights
Traditional LED street lights consist of the lamp, pole, base, lines, and other attachments. They emit light through electronic transitions in semiconductor materials. The white LED has a luminous efficiency as high as 80 lm/W, so it can save 50% to 60% of the energy consumption of the high-pressure sodium lights. Moreover, these LED lights can work for 10 years, thus saving on replacement and maintenance costs. In addition, the color rendering index is also improved and can reach 75 to 80. LED lights can show the road condition more clearly than HPS lights.
Solar street lights
Solar LED street lights add solar panels, special batteries, and other components on the basis of traditional street lights. At night, these lights can use the energy collected by the solar panels and stored by the batteries. At present, the solar street light price is relatively expensive, which is about 3 times that of general street lights, but its late maintenance cost is low. Because the solar street light adopts distributed circuit control, the switch and energy conversion of the street light are all intelligently controlled without manual operation, so the maintenance cost is reduced.
All-in-one solar street lights
The integrated lamp head (solar panel, controller, lithium battery, and light source), which is easy to install and maintain, is part of the integrated solar street lamp system. With human body sensing, light control, time control, over-charge, over-discharge, and reverse protection, as well as smart control, etc., the controller is often located inside the integrated lamp head. Trench digging and wiring are not required; however, the light pole must be erected on the embedded portion (concrete foundation).
Prices of solar, all-in-one solar, and traditional street lights
Traditional street lights
The new LED technology makes the price of LED street lights higher than that of the old high pressure sodium street lights. The price of a whole set of HPS street lights is normally $150-250, while that of LED street lights is around $400-700. The reason is that these two have totally different principles for producing electricity, and LED street lights use materials of better quality.
Solar street lights
In order to make use of the solar energy and solve the problem of electricity shortages, solar lights have more high-tech components, such as the solar panels and the batteries. Therefore, the solar street light price is relatively higher than that of LED street lights, which can be three times more expensive.
All-in-one solar street lights
As for all-in-one solar street lights, due to their all-in-one design, panel power and battery capacitors are generally relatively small, and the cost is relatively lower than solar street lights. Besides, it saves the cost of installing and fixing the panel bracket, the cost of the battery box, and so on. Most of their applications are in places where the lighting requirements are not too high.
Costs of installation
Traditional street lights
Two main aspects of the installation costs for the traditional street lights are the costs of transformers and cables. Since, for the same brightness, LEDs need less power than HPS street lights, their cable load flow will also be lower. This means that the cross-sectional area of a copper cable is small, and the smaller this area, the cheaper it will be. The cables for LED street lights can be 10 times cheaper than HPS street lights. As for the transformers, LED street lights will also need fewer of them than HPS street lights, saving 60% of the costs.
Solar street lights
Things will be a lot easier with solar street lights. The costs of installation for them can only include the construction of the base and the wages for the workers to install and test the lights. For other items like digging, pipelines, cables, transformers, and so on, the costs will be zero.
All-in-one solar street lights
The integrated solar street lamp device is simple and does not require laying cables. The only thing to do to install the all-in-one solar lights is to make a cement base and then fix the lights with stainless screws. Compared with ordinary solar street lights, it also does not need to dig holes to bury batteries, saving installation costs.
Costs of electricity
Traditional street lights
When the other conditions are the same, the cost of electricity is totally determined by the power. So the power bill of the traditional HPS lights will be 2-3 times more expensive than that of the LED street lights. This cost is the product of the power, working hours, number of lights, and the cost per kilowatt-hour.
Solar street lights & All-in-one solar street lights
The costs of electricity will be zero as they obtain the power from the sunlight.
Costs of maintenance
Traditional street lights
The cost of maintenance is related to the lifespan of the lights. For LED street lights, the good ones can have a service life of 10 years. But once it breaks down, normally you will need to buy a new lamp, because there are many standards of the LED lights. It is a large part of the maintenance costs. Still, it costs much less than HPS lights because the lifespan of some HPS lights is only one year. Besides changing the lamp, you will also need to consider the costs of maintaining the cables and other equipment.
Solar street lights
The lifespan of the batteries largely determines the cost of maintenance. The batteries have a shelf life, and once they expire, their performance will not be as good as before. Changing a battery may cost you $50-100, depending on what types of batteries you have.
All-in-one solar street lights
If the all-in-one solar street lights are not working, you don’t need to buy an entire new one. You can check the components of the light and figure out where the problem is.
Are solar street lights worth it?
Through the analysis above, you may understand why solar street lights are so expensive. They are applying the newest technology to obtain energy from the sunlight, which requires many new components. Even though it is expensive at the beginning, it will save the power bill for you. For maintenance, sometimes you will only need to change the batteries. Their function of lighting up the streets with sunlight is what makes them worthy. If you cannot afford it, you can choose LED street lights. They are energy-saving, long-lasting, and more familiar to most people.
Conclusions
The solar street light price is more expensive than that of traditional street lights, but it will save on the costs of running, installing, and maintaining the lights. If the solar street lights work well, their total costs will be lower than those of traditional street lights. But LED street lights are also a good choice since the technology is more mature. You can find LED street lights of the highest quality at Mokolight, the best Chinese LED light manufacturer with an experience of more than 17 years. The LED lights with the most competitive prices are the best choice for your street lights!
