30th Annual Student Research Conference
Light Pollution Outreach in Kirksville
Emily C. Wren* and Ashley K. Herdman
Dr. Vayujeet Gokhale, Faculty Mentor
In this talk, we discuss outreach activities at the public and administrative level related to light pollution within the Kirksville community. The amount of light wasted on campus by the current light fixtures pollutes the night sky, disrupts astronomical data collection, and wastes energy. We discuss mitigating these problems by using more efficient light fixtures. We show that we can have small but significant direct savings by moving to better lighting, and can also have indirect benefits on student and ecosystem health and safety.
We provide an outline of our outreach efforts including plans submitted to the Sustainability Committee and our communications with AmerenUE and City of Kirksville to reduce the community's overall light pollution. We conclude with a call to action to all members of the Truman and Kirksville community to act against the growing nuisance of light pollution.
Keywords: Light pollution, Astronomy, Environment, Outreach
Topic(s):Environmental Studies
Astronomy
Physics
Presentation Type: Oral Paper
Session: 405-3
Location: MG 2050
Time: 3:00