U.S. utilities pursue Smart Grid network for LED street lights

Florida Power & Light FPL, already working with Silver Spring on North AmericaÂ’s largest networked street light project under contract, expanded its program from 75,000 street lights to nearly 500,000 street lights across its 35 county service territory statewide.

FPL will also leverage the vendor's software to control and manage the networked street lights. The FPL connected street light initiative is believed to be the largest networked street lights program under contract in the world.

Silver Spring also announced that additional industry leaders including Baltimore Gas & Electric BG&E, ComEd, and Pepco Holdings Inc. PHI are partnering with the vendor on networked street light and smart city technology projects.

“Networked street lights have great potential to benefit our customers,” said Manny Miranda, Vice President of Power Delivery for Florida Power & Light. “As we expand our program to nearly 500,000 lights, Silver Spring’s technology enables FPL to help improve the reliability and efficiency of our street light network while also supporting the ongoing performance of our smart grid.”

“We are excited about the benefits these smart street lights can deliver to our customers and our communities. By connecting street lights to our network, we can dim them at the right time to reduce usage and save money, and brighten them to help create safer streets – we can even give emergency responders the ability to control street lights on-demand,” said Anne Pramaggiore, President and CEO of ComEd.

“We’re excited to partner with FPL and many more of our utility clients as they continue to lead the industry forward. In much the same way that we pioneered infrastructure modernization efforts through the smart grid, Silver Spring technology is helping improve the reliability, efficiency, and quality of service of their street light networks,” said Scott Lang, Chairman, President and CEO, Silver Spring Networks. “Silver Spring’s multi-application platform allows utilities to both strengthen their existing smart grid infrastructure and unlock new benefits from a networked street light grid, while also establishing a foundation for additional smart city applications and services that can be added in the future.”