Businesses shine in helping to find traffic-light solutions
Nelson Mandela Bay businesses have once again come to the rescue — this time in a partnership that will see several traffic lights become operational even during load-shedding.
Yesterday, the city announced that 12 businesses had approached the municipality in a bid to minimise the effects of blackouts for motorists and the business sector in the Bay.
Thanks to the partnership, motorists will have some respite at key intersections no matter the stage of loadshedding.
Yesterday, the municipality announced that 18 intersections around the metro were being upgraded in a pilot project seeking to mitigate the detrimental impact of load-shedding on the city’s economy.
This is a result of 12 businesses sponsoring traffic lights.
“As the saying goes, when times are tough, the tough get going, and that’s exactly what these business owners did,” mayor Retief Odendaal said.
“We know load-shedding will be with us for the foreseeable future and we need to find innovative ways of collaborating with the private sector to find solutions.”
The traffic-light controllers are made of a unit which allows for a reliable supply of energy to traffic lights, enabling them to remain running even during power outages.
According to Odendaal, when grid power returns with a fluctuating voltage, the controller will delay and monitor the voltage for one minute to ensure a stable power input and avoid load damage.
“If the uninterrupted power system (UPS) pilot is successful, the metro will roll out the systems to more intersections.”
The location of the UPS systems will remain confidential to prevent vandalism and theft of the units.
The Nelson Mandela Bay municipality said measures would be put in place to ensure protection of the units.
The traffic-lights move comes as the municipality installs 2,100 energy-saving LED street lights.
According to the city, the LED lights use fewer kilowatts per hour and it estimates that more than R2m in electricity consumption has been saved since the start of the project.
Electricity and energy political head Lance Grootboom said the city had established a sustainable energy sub-directorate to focus solely on renewable energy, aligning the city’s energy plan with current industry trends.
“In the medium term, the refurbishment of the gas turbine at Mount Road with an installed capacity of 50MW will operate at around 40MW, which is equivalent to two stages of load-shedding,” Grootboom said.