Join Keep Sedona Beautiful on Wednesday, May 10th for its Preserving the Wonder Speaker Series to hear Jeffrey Hall, Director of Lowell Observatory, discuss
what we as individuals and as a global community can do to preserve the richness of Sedona's dark skies.
Free to members, residents and visitors – all are welcome to join Keep Sedona Beautiful ("KSB") at 5:30 p.m. at its historic Pushmataha Center on 360 Brewer Road. The evening will include complimentary appetizers donated by El Rincon Restaurante Mexicano and refreshments provided by KSB.
According to Dr. Hall, "Outdoor lighting is presently in the midst of enormous change as communities across the nation and worldwide change from the long-used gas-discharge lamps, such as high-pressure sodium, to various types of light-emitting diode (LED) fixtures."
There are compelling reasons to make this change, including the long lifetimes of LEDs and the associated reduced maintenance and replacement costs. But so far, the LEDs commonly implemented have a very blue-rich spectrum that is ruinous to dark skies. Widespread adoption of such fixtures will result in a
dramatic growth in sky glow worldwide – at a time when much of the world's population already can no longer see the Milky Way."
Happily, many much better LED options are available.White LEDs are available in less harsh colors, and, even better, various types of filtered and narrow-spectrum options are available."
In this presentation, I will discuss the main properties of a good, dark-sky preserving light, what types of dark-sky-friendly LEDs are available, and present some guidelines that communities can use when an LED conversion is being considered.
LEDs don't have to be a bad thing, and by adopting them thoughtfully, we can employ them for outdoor lighting while preserving the beautiful starry skies that enrich all our lives."
A Flagstaff resident for more than 20 years, Dr. Jeffrey Hall has served as Director of Lowell Observatory since June 2010. He joined the staff at Lowell in 1992 as a postdoctoral research fellow. He received a B. A. in Physics in 1986 from Johns Hopkins and a Ph.D. in Astronomy and Astrophysics in 1991 from Penn State. His research at Lowell has focused on solar and stellar activity cycles, with the goal of lending an astronomical perspective to solar influences on terrestrial climate. He presently serves as a member of Flagstaff's leadership group, the Flagstaff Forty, and is former President of the Governing Board of Northland Preparatory Academy as well as of the Board of Directors of the Flagstaff Symphony Orchestra. His principal avocation is music and he has been the substitute organist at Flagstaff's Episcopal Church of the Epiphany for many years.
Keep Sedona Beautiful's monthly Preserving the Wonder™ Speaker Series is held the second Wednesday of each month from September through May. It focuses on presenting a diversity of programs relevant to the unique environment of our region.