DARKSIDE OF LIGHT POLLUTION

by Achmad Zainur Rozzykin (FMIPA/16014196)

Basically, light pollution is a condition with excessive intensity of light. Light

pollution decreases amount of the stars that we could see in the night sky. The light of
artificial lights competes with the starlight in the night sky and disrupts most of
astronomical activities. In general, light pollution caused by improper lighting system
which makes the light from the artificial light sources escape to the sky and scattered
by the atmosphere. The artificial light could be the light from outdoor light decoration,
bad streetlights fixtures, advertising, illuminated sport venues, and another outdoor
light sources. Light pollution has been one of the environmental issues in the world. It
attracts the attention of some concerned people. One of them is The International DarkSky Association (IDA). IDA focuses on raising people awareness of the light pollution.
Just like another forms of pollution, light pollution also gives bad impacts. Not only on
astronomical activities, but also on health, energy, and ecosystem.
Astronomy is the field that most harmed by the light pollution. Because of the
light pollution, astronomers couldnt do the observation well. Skyglow is the most
responsible suspect to this problem. Skyglow decreases the contrast between the
starlight and the sky itself. It makes the astronomers hard to observe faint sky objects
such as distant galaxies, nebula, stars, and another objects. Even in the urban area, we
could only see the Moon, some planets, and bright stars. Not only skyglow, light
trespass also disrupts the observation. The artificial lights enters the telescope and it
may cause some glowing spots on the field of view beyond the telescope. Those
glowing spots will reduce the contrast between the sky object and the sky. If this
condition continues, the development of astronomy will be stucked. Science could be
stucked on its place now because of the light pollution. Light pollution becomes a
barrier and we couldnt get the data and everything we need for the sake of science.

Excessive light exposure gives some impact on humans health. Human

hormonal cycle disturbed by the unnatural light. Human hormonal cycle would be
affected because of the luminous night and it may affected health and psychology.
Over-illumination may cause headache and fatigue. Over-illumination considered as a
carcinogen because there is a correlation between excessive light and increased
possibility on breast cancer on women and prostat cancer on men. Excessive light gives
some effects on sleep disruption and melatonin hormones suppression. It may cause
some long-term effects such as stress, anxiety, and effects on mood. Some animals also
get the impact of light pollution. Insects have a great attraction on light. When insects
are attracted to lamps they can be killed by exhaustion or directly contact with the lamp
itself. The mass death of insects can affect the food chain and the ecosystem could be
unstable. Lights of buildings make some species of migrating birds confused. Basically,
birds use the starlight as their navigator. But, some light from the buildings disorient
them. At last, they would die because of crashing glass windows. In Toronto, more
than 1000 bird from 89 species died because of this in 3 months period. There are a lot
of negative impacts on humans life and also on animals life caused by light pollution.
Light pollution also considered as one of the energy waste indicator. Why?
Because when light pollution occurred, many lighting must be used. But we know that
not all of them are necessary. According to Wikipedia, lighting consumed a quarter of
all electricity in this world. In Australia, a country with 1.94 million public lights, they
have to pay more than A$210 million every year, consume 1,035 GWh of electricity,
and emit 1.15 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2). In our daily life, lighting
consume 20%-50% of total energy we use in our home. But tragically, in some office
buildings, 90% of their lighting is unnecessary and of course it causes light pollution.
What does it mean? It means that we should use lights properly. Using unnecessary
and excessive amount of light may cause light pollution and it may waste our energy
too. And wasting energy means wasting our money too, right?
Light pollution also have a contribution on our environmental changing. Based
on the research done by American Geophysical Union in San Fransisco, the excessive

light in the atmosphere destroys nitrate radicals and it disrupts the normal night time
reduction of the smog that produced by the fumes emitted by the cars and factories on
the Earth. The one who study this named Harald Stark from National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration. Light pollution also change the moonlit. It already
proved that excessive light in the night decrease the intensity of polarized moonlit.
Because of the light, the moonlit isnt strongly polarized. Its not a big deal for us as
human because we couldnt see the difference of polarized moonlit and unpolarized
moonlit. But, some scientist said that polarized moonlit used by birds and another
migrating faunas as navigator. More or less, light pollution also have a contribution on
our environment.
From the explanation above, we can conclude that a simple thing like using too
much light has many unrealized negative impacts. We can find the negative impacts on
every aspects for our life. The greatest impact felt by the astronomers or scientist
because light pollution disturb their observation activity. Not only on the science
development, we can also find the impact of light pollution in our health, animals
behavior, energy consumption or even in our environment. Because there are so many
negative impact for our life, we should try to reduce light pollution as well. But the
question is: What can we do to save the world from the darkside of the light pollution?
We can even try to help from the very small things, like turn off the light when we
dont use it or just close the curtain when we turn on the light inside our room. But
beside that, we also can do big things for our society. The main thing is using the light
source effectively. We have to choose the lamp with the minimum intensity to our
necessity. Managing our lighting fixtures will also help too. Especially for the outdoor
lighting like streetlight, we have to direct the light to where it is needed accurately. And
for the long-term period, we have to redesign or evaluate our lighting plans. We can
arrange our lighting based on our necessity. Now, we know that light pollution have
many bad impacts. But the more important thing is we know what to do to reduce it
and save the world from the darkside of light pollution.

References

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_pollution

(From

Wikipedia,

the

free

encyclopedia. Accessed on May 6th, 2015 7.08 pm)

2. "Public LightingEnergy Efficient Street Lighting". Environment.gov.au.
3. Fonken, L K, et al. "Influence of light at night on murine anxiety- and
depressive-like responses". Behavioural Brain Research
4. Plitnick B, et al. "The effects of long-wavelength red and short-wavelength blue
lights on alertness and mood at night". Lighting Research and Technology
5. Hansen, J (2001). "Increased breast cancer risk among women who work
predominantly at night". Epidemiology (Cambridge, Mass.)
6. http://www.agu.org/cgibin/SFgate/SFgate?language=English&verbose=0&listenv=table&application
=fm10&convert=&converthl=&refinequery=&formintern=&formextern=&tra
nsquery=au%3dstark&_lines=&multiple=0&descriptor=%2fdata%2fepubs%2
fwais%2findexes%2ffm10%2ffm10 (From American Geophysical Union
website. Accessed on May 9th, 2015 10.15 am)