Residents Complain About Solar Street Lamps

An article about a Buffalo suburb where local residents are fighting the town to remove the solar street lamps brings up an important point.  In order for environmentally "friendlier" products to succeed they must be able to compete with other products in their class.

When I first read the title of the article I thought, "Why would people be so against solar street lamps?"  It sounds like a great idea, right?  It should save energy, and lots of it.  According to the article:

At the time the contract was approved, town officials said the contract was projected to save the town $1.2 million over the next 15 years.

Complaints regarding the lamps range from aesthetics to brightness (not bright enough) to outages.

Although some people in this world are willing to make large compromises in order to help out the environment, new eco-products and services will not be able to survive in the marketplace if they can not live up to the standards of consumers.

In this case in Buffalo, what will happen if the residents win and they replace the solar lamps with regular gaslights or electric lights?  Will it create even more waste than if they hadn’t changed anything at all?

Buffalo News: ‘Residents want town to get rid of solar street lights’