Keeping light pollution at bay: a red-lines, target values, top-down approach

TL;DR

This paper proposes a top-down 'red-lines' approach for light pollution regulation, setting clear limits on night degradation to complement existing local source controls, thereby improving policy effectiveness.

Contribution

It introduces a novel 'red-lines' strategy for light pollution control, emphasizing a top-down policy framework to set enforceable limits on night sky degradation.

Findings

The approach provides methodological tools for science-informed policy decisions.

A case-study illustrates practical application of the 'red-lines' strategy.

The strategy enhances existing local controls by establishing clear degradation limits.

Abstract

The prevailing regulatory framework for light pollution control is based on establishing conditions on individual light sources or single installations (regarding features like ULOR, spectrum, illuminance levels, glare, ...), in the hope that an ensemble of individually correct lighting installations will be effective to somehow solve this problem. This "local sources" approach is indeed necessary, and shall no doubt be enforced; however, it seems to be clearly insufficient for curbing the actual process of degradation of the night, and for effectively attaining the necessary remediation goals. In this paper we describe a complementary (not substitutive) 'red-lines' strategy that should in our opinion be adopted as early as possible in the policies for light pollution control. This top-down approach seeks to set definite limits on the allowable degradation of the night, providing the methodological tools required for making science-informed public policy decisions and for managing the transition processes. Light pollution abatement should routinely be included as an integral part of any territorial management plan. A practical application case-study is described to illustrate these concepts.