Te Kuiti celebrated becoming New Zealand’s first fully LED lit town at Genesis Energy’s ‘Lights On’ event with a light show at the shearing statue last Thursday. Photo: Supplied
More than 400 people turned out to mark a bright move for Te Kūiti last week as it aims to become the first town in New Zealand to be fully lit by LED lights.
The ‘Lights On’ event was part of Genesis Energy’s wider ‘The Great Lightbulb Switch’ campaign which kicked off at The Great New Zealand Muster event in April, designed to demonstrate the savings a town could make by switching to LED bulbs.
The weather was miserable, but people lined up for free lightbulbs, a hot dog and chips, before enjoying a show at the town’s shearing statue to mark the occasion.
Te Kuiti celebrated becoming New Zealand’s first fully LED lit town at Genesis Energy’s ‘Lights On’ event with a light show at the shearing statue last Thursday. Photo: Supplied
Waitomo mayor John Robertson thanked everyone for coming out and Genesis Energy for choosing Te Kuiti for the pilot programme, before Genesis Energy general manager retail James Ryan explained the project’s mission.
“A lot of people who came into the office today asked me, ‘Why is Genesis doing this?’. Genesis is on a mission; Genesis’ mission is to lower the cost of energy for New Zealand.
Genesis as a company is doing some big things, is spending billions of dollars building new renewable power stations and trying to convert Huntly (Power Station) to biomass, but that’s not enough,” Ryan said.
“We can’t do it just by doing big things, we need to do it by lots of little actions as well. Someone in Te Kuiti changing a light bulb might sound like a small action, but when you multiply it by thousands, you achieve what we’ve achieved today which is converting an entire town.
“Next we’re trying to work out how can we take what we’ve done here today by bringing people together and take it to the whole country,” he said.
More than 10,000 free Ecobulb LED lightbulbs have been given away to Te Kūiti households since the project launched in April.
Genesis Energy guessed it could collectively save the town more than $400,000 a year in electricity costs.
Genesis Energy chief revenue officer Stephen England-Hall said Te Kūiti is showing what’s possible when a community comes together around a practical idea.
“LED bulbs use up to 90 percent less energy than traditional incandescent bulbs. Removing old bulbs is the equivalent of taking a small city off the grid and puts money back in the pockets of households already facing rising costs going into winter,” England-Hall said.
Genesis Energy will track energy use across Te Kūiti over winter, measuring household savings, kilowatt hours reduced and carbon emissions avoided.
Te Kuiti celebrated becoming New Zealand’s first fully LED lit town at Genesis Energy’s ‘Lights On’ event with a light show at the shearing statue last Thursday. Photo: Supplied
