LED Street Lights May Cause Cancer, Heart Disease - American Medical Association

Vox Clamatis in Deserto · Sep 26, 2016

Just saw this WaPo hit piece on LED's. Remember how we just had to get rid of incandescents to save the planet? Will this become a new rallying cry for 'activists'? Will there be a move to install lights with lower Kelvin temperatures that are similar in output to the incandescents that the newer technologies replaced? Will there be a coming raft of EPA, OSHA, NHTSA and other regulations in this area?

Some excerpts from the Washington Post article:

Some cities are taking another look at LED lighting after AMA warning

By Michael Ollove September 25, 2016

If people are sleepless in Seattle, it may not be only because they have broken hearts.

The American Medical Association issued a warning in June that high-intensity LED streetlights — such as those in Seattle, Los Angeles, New York, Houston and elsewhere — emit unseen blue light that can disturb sleep rhythms and possibly increase the risk of serious health conditions, including cancer and cardiovascular disease. The AMA also cautioned that those light-emitting-diode lights can impair nighttime driving vision.

Similar concerns have been raised over the past few years, but the AMA report adds credence to the issue and is likely to prompt cities and states to reevaluate the intensity of LED lights they install.

Scott Thomsen, a spokesman for Seattle City Lights, which is responsible for the city's exterior illumination, dismissed the health concerns about bright-white LED lights, noting that they emit less of the problematic blue wavelengths than most computers and televisions.

Mark Hartman, Phoenix's chief sustainability officer, said the city might go with a mix of the intense lights for major intersections and ballpark areas that need very bright light and a softer light for residential areas. He said the city would consider the health arguments, although he, too, mentioned the glow from computers and televisions. "Nobody says don't watch television or use your computer after 9 p.m. because of blue lights," he said.

The Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency "put a lot of push into them," said Michael Siminovitch, director of the California Lighting Technology Center at the University of California at Davis. "I call it a rush."

Siminovitch said the light from early-generation LEDs "really negatively impacts people's physiological well-being."

"As a species, we weren't designed to see light at night," Siminovitch said.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nati...779568-7c3d-11e6-bd86-b7bbd53d2b5d_story.html

Here's a link to the AMA report:

https://download.ama-assn.org/resources/doc/csaph/a16-csaph2.pdf

Beware that 'unseen' blue light.

MichaelW · Sep 26, 2016

Just use a filter to remove the blue wavelengths.
Selective yellow would be cool.

StarHalo · Sep 26, 2016

I wonder what the report was typed on..

18650 · Sep 28, 2016

StarHalo said:
I wonder what the report was typed on..

Did metal halide lamps cause cancer when they were introduced?

markr6 · Sep 28, 2016

In a few years, at least one study will say broccoli causes cancer.

Vox Clamatis in Deserto · Sep 28, 2016

So much of the contemporary 'science' presented to the public seems to somehow have a progressive political agenda attached. I have replaced a lot of the incandescent lights in my home with LED's. Am I putting my family at risk with that 'unseen blue light'?

Will the 'People's Climate March' demand restrictions on Kelvin temperatures next?

From the Huffington Post:

LEDs Are An Important Climate Change Solution

09/23/2014 04:25 pm ET | Updated Nov 23, 2014

The People's Climate March raised awareness about how important it is to find and use technologies that will help save energy, reduce carbon dioxide emissions, and start to reverse climate change. One of the most promising and affordable technologies is LED light bulbs, also known as LEDs.

WHY SHIFT TO LEDS? The Three P's...

Making the shift to energy-efficient lighting offers big benefits for people, the planet and our pocketbooks.

PEOPLE — LED bulbs help reduce air pollution, making the air healthier to breathe for kids and others who suffer from asthma, heart disease and many respiratory ailments.

Reduce air pollution — Most household energy still comes from coal-burning power plants. About 12 percent of the energy we use at home powers our lighting — from ceiling fixtures and under-counter lights to table and bedside lamps. An LED bulb uses 70-90 percent less energy than a standard bulb, limiting the need to burn that much more coal.

PLANET — Speaking of energy, if every household replaced just one light bulb with one certified by the federal Energy Star program, we would save enough energy to light two million homes for a whole year.

Reduce climate change — We would also prevent greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to that of 550,000 vehicles. LED bulbs are a terrific way to fight climate change.

POCKETBOOK — Any time we save energy, we save money. Though an LED bulb costs a little more up front, it can save $80 in electricity costs over the lifetime of the product.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/diane-maceachern/energy-star-leds-are-an-i_b_5854384.html

DIWdiver · Sep 28, 2016

Vox Clamatis in Deserto said:
Am I putting my family at risk with that 'unseen blue light'?

If you read the original AMA article, the health impact is via the mechanism of sleep disruption. I'm certainly not a doctor and nothing I say should be construed as medical advice, but it seems to me that if your family is sleeping well, the lights pose negligible health risk. I would guess that evening use of screen devices might be more problematic.

CuriousOne · Sep 29, 2016

Current led lights have too much blue in their spectrum, and it does really affects a lot of things.

And it does not needs to be seen by eye, light output might be warm white, but still have too much blue in it.

degarb · Sep 30, 2016

In the 1980's, most people believed that sleep could be cycled down. We now have MRI evidence that metabolic waste products are only removed from the brain after sleep begins. The brain blood barrier opens up.

So, with dim incan's around we were still very sleep deprived in the 1980's as we strove for the top. If you tried to get a sane amount, you would have been derided as lazy. I think 4.5 to 6 hours was the goal. I never could sustain an average below 7h40min; and even then crashed much.

There is a wonderful thing invented called the eye mask, the light switch, and (health/longevity related) education.

Any technology, medicine, behavior, cable tier, car, computer, is harmful if not managed properly. It is all about consumer education, NOT REGULATION-which is cheaper, and provenly, more effective.

degarb · Sep 30, 2016

CuriousOne said:
Current led lights have too much blue in their spectrum, and it does really affects a lot of things.

And it does not needs to be seen by eye, light output might be warm white, but still have too much blue in it.

Sorry, for my last post: it fails to point out the most obvious flaw with this whole AMA suggestion. And it is a BIG DOOZY of a flaw! You are NOT going to protect people's lives by encouraging drivers to be SLEEPY!!! You want drivers to be alert! This is not the time to relax and unwind! Sleep is important, but not on the road!

Go home, dim your led lighting, turn off the led backlit TV, turn off the led backlit tablet/computer (both have way more blue than any streetlights, given proximity to the eye), and put on a eye mask if you are married.

DIWdiver · Sep 30, 2016

I think the concern is for the people who live by the lights, not the ones who drive by them.

degarb · Sep 30, 2016

DIWdiver said:
I think the concern is for the people who live by the lights, not the ones who drive by them.

You mean those that cannot afford blinds and live beside the lights. Drapes may also protect you from home invasion. Education!... My wife actually had the ..... to argue that light doesn't affect energy, mood and sleep patterns. While yelling at me to turn out any light at dawn, but not the 2000 lumen TV at night. I have had several employees complain they can't fall to sleep-all, refuse to turn off the Tonight Show and late,late show. Computer and phone use, has added even more to the problem. But, you gain nothing, but a breeze, by not having drapes. Still a 80,000 lumen 400 watt HPS is not much better shining into your window than a 40,000 lumen 400watt MH, nor a 25,000 lumen directional LED. It seems the lower lumen directional LED would produce far less light pollution and sleep disruption. I don't think they-the AMA- understand enough the technology or situation to comment. They do understand light disrupts circadian rythm, the loss of sleep increases stress and fatigue increases hunger (brain thinks it can eat its way to alertness). Stress ages people very fast. Moreover, the weight gain from both stress eating and the fatigue hunger, will age and lead to type 2 diabetes (which was a death sentence in decades past), which leads to all kinds of illness and vicious cycles. However, picking on street lighting is plainly stupid; we need alert drivers! There are times were being alert is key to survival-driving is clearly one. A wreck can not only injure car occupants, but houses and occupants along the road.

degarb · Oct 3, 2016

An facinating article on light/ganlion cells (non-image-forming photoreceptive system) is https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2848671/#!po=0.212766

I personally wouldn't use warm light to wake up. Other frequecies work, but much less than 480 nm blue (according to article) Violet is half as effective. the hps has blue at a fraction of the 580 nm. Also, the last guest on Dr. Rhonda Patric Podcast talked alot about the circadian rythms. I think he misspoke, saying you need 1000 lux to activate these cells; I think he meant 1000 lux to fully activate. Also, eating apparently helps wake up mammals. So, to loose weight (without lowering daily caloric intake) and regulate sleep patterns, do not eat for several hours before bedtime (hard socially). I am a big believer of 6 to 9 hours before bedtime. So, they should regulate food commercials and restaurant times for public health-nothing after 4 pm.

Lynx_Arc · Oct 3, 2016

I wonder if the cool white fluorescent lights were studied also along the lines of this article and HID headlamps too.

RollerBoySE · Oct 3, 2016

So according to this theory it's a health hazard to live in Scandinavia? (In the northern parts the sun never sets during the summer, called the midnight sun.) I always sleep better when the sun is up, so I don't care much for this mumbo jumbo so called science...

idleprocess · Oct 3, 2016

I recall that (now largely defunct) mercury-vapor lamps put out a sickly blue-green glow; I wonder if they would register under these studies. Metal halide has similar-ish emission profiles and we've certainly put out a large number of them in the form of streetlights and parking lot lights to displace the sick industrial yellow of high-pressure sodium lamps and their ~20 CRI.

LED Street Lights May Cause Cancer, Heart Disease - American Medical Association

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