Dark Skies & Outdoor Lighting

Poorly designed lighting emits light upward and not down where it is needed!

Click (tap) to enlarge this 2017 NASA image of the US at night.

Find more light pollution maps and tools at this link.

Light pollution is stealing the night from all of us, and, despite the growing concern over our carbon footprint, we are still over-lighting our communities with inefficient and glaring light fixtures. This is an international problem. Once a source of wonder (and one-half of the entire planet’s natural environment), the star-filled nights of just a few years ago are vanishing in a yellow haze.
Human-produced light pollution mars our view of the stars, and poor lighting threatens astronomy, disrupts ecosystems and wildlife, affects human health and circadian rhythms, creates unsafe glare and light trespass, contributes to climate change, and wastes money and energy to the tune of $2.2 billion per year in the U.S. alone.

DarkSky International (DSI), formerly the International Dark-Sky Association (IDA), is a non-profit that is the recognized authority on light pollution. Founded in 1988, DSI is the first organization to call attention to the hazards of light pollution, and its accomplishments have been tremendous.

For resources on dark-sky lighting fixtures (types and sources), and for more light pollution information, visit the DSI website.

“Technology hath vanquished
the night!”
– Edward Abbey

“The night sky, filled with stars, is celebrated and protected around the world as a shared heritage benefiting all living things”.
– DSI vision statement

“To go in the dark with a light
is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark.
Go without sight,
and find that the dark too
blooms and sings,
and is traveled by dark feet
and dark wings.”
– Wendell Berry