Basseterre, St. Kitts (June 16th, 2020) — The St. Kitts Electricity Company Limited (SKELEC) installed thirty turtle-friendly LED streetlights on the island main road in Keys on Monday June 15, 2020. The turtle-sensitive streetlights are amber in colour and are intended to discourage turtles — that typically after nesting on Keys Beach follow bright white light and wander onto the island main road — from straying away from the sea.
According to the St. Kitts Sea Turtle Monitoring Network (SKSTMN), the amber lights are beneficial to the turtles and can increase the low number of hatchlings which make it to the reproductive stage.
The installation is part of an island-wide streetlight change-out project which began in April 2020, financed through a loan from the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) totalling approximately EC$15,638,000 (US$5,792,000) to facilitate the retrofit of about 10,760 lamps on both St. Kitts and Nevis. SKELEC anticipates that the changeout project will be completed by end of year.