The LED project is based upon national energy action plans that present national strategies on how the EU Member States intend to achieve their adopted energy savings target by 2016. It aims at providing verified arguments for a conversion of city & road lighting to the energy-saving, environmentally friendly and versatile LED-technology, promoting the LED-technology, creating know-how and raising the awareness for energy-saving. It shall create test pilots and best practices on innovative methods of public lighting in cities and regions.Focus will be to investigate in effective measures to reduce the energy consumption and CO2 emissions caused by public lighting.The project will therefore establish a network on international, national, regional and local level in order to adapt the existing LED solutions to municipal needs and stimulate & facilitate rapid conversion to LED.The projects activities are structured in four components:C 1: Coordination & ManagementC 1 includes the overall management of the project, including coordination of progress, financial management, information management and reporting. C 2: Promotion & Information & EducationC2 is dedicated to the promotion of the projects activities, results and the overall message to use energy efficient technology in order to reduce energy consumption. The planned promotion activities shall effect a change in thinking at political level, administrational level and the general public.C 3: Technology & design, users needsC 3 targets at cluster building between researchers, staff of light fitting producers, civil servants & decision makers for know-how exchange. Education activities for children & youth will be realised as well as investigation in users demands, the market and development of adapted design solutions of LED lighting for specific areas and user types.C 4: LED Lighting in context of city planning & road planningIn C 4 pilot investments into LED lighting applications will be realised in selected test areas. It involves all necessary pre-planning, the construction, the testing and evaluation of the LED applications. The partners will support each other with gained know-how and transfer the results within planners workshops.The project will result in: • Raised awareness of the advantages of LED technology due to a targeted information campaign• Increased commitment to the implementation of LED in public lighting to save energy and costs• A triple helix network for lobbying of LED technology• Durable education effects / Guide on lighting demands & inventory of status of technological development• Developed standards for public lighting by LED• Design manual for planners & manufacturers• Pilot LED lighting installations & evaluation results à Best practice models and applicable LED solutions for lighting in public space as convincing arguments for future investments into lighting infrastructure in cities & regions of South BSR & beyond Achievements: The working procedures in our cross-border partnership are set and running smoothly. Besides the usual channels the new communication tool Adobe Connect additio-nally improves the cooperation. It allows us to meet once per month to discuss the projects progress. The Steering Group has initiated a Scientific Board with the tasks 1) to follow up and monitor that the project results, outputs and reports are on a relevant scientific level and 2) to cover on-going research and give input to the project partners from the scientific world. In the last project period all partners met for a final partner project meeting besides the LED Academy / KHES 3 – Final Conference of the LED project in Wismar (GER) 27-29 Mar 2012.The project begins to gather speed on all levels. The partners are very active in contributing to the discourse on European level, as well as on national and regional level. The objectives and activities of LED project were presented and discussed in seminars, lectures and exhibitions of various conferences, events & fairs tackling sustainable development measures. The partners address all different stakeholder groups: politicians, decision makers, civil servants, the scientific world, the lighting industry and of course the general public. With workshops in schools & a mobile exhibition we also addressed children & youth. To be most effective we follow a multi-measure communication plan. The LED website is online at www.ledlightproject.eu. We also promote on Facebook and YouTube. Our newsletter is sent out twice a year. An exhibition stand, brochures, flyers, posters, role-ups and other promotion material are used to inform about the project. Our activities got displayed in newspapers, radio interviews and TV programmes. In a final step we are developing common print media for promotional purposes & a final result manual summarizing the lessons learned. Partners published articles as well as press releases and scientific articles based on project results. The last newsletter was sent out to inform about the final conference. Three versions of print media have been developed by PP3 which was supported by the contribution of information by all project partners. These will inform general public, politicians and civil servants as well as manufacturers. Component 3 brings together three important aspects of LED: technology, design and users needs. Here we intend to build up clusters among the different stakeholder groups. Researchers, light fitting producers, civil servants and decision-makers get together in three know-how exchange seminars to create lighting solutions fitting all needs. The first international seminar took place in 2010 in Klaipeda, Lithuania, the second in March 2011 in Kalmar, Sweden. The partners investigated users demands via polls and light tests within the chosen test installation fields, researched the market for applicable products and got in contact with light-fitting producers at fairs and seminars. The university partners took care of compiling the state-of-the-art in lighting design applications. They compiled a best practice guide with examples from all over the world, participated in various conferences on architectural lighting and welcomed the scientific world to the Light Symposium at the Royal Technical University in Stockholm, Sweden. The projects student design competition The Dark and Street Lights Challenge was carried out. Now the result manual is developed, involving contributions from all partners by using our internal online working platform. The LED Academy / KHES 3 – Final Conference of the LED project in Wismar (GER) 27-29 Mar 2012 took place which was a fruitful know how exchange between partners, manufacturers, civil servants and politicians. Moreover partner from Germany (PP2, PP6, PP12) used the opportunity to demonstrate their installations realised during the project lifetime. The scientific report as a common result of the project was finalised.To bring the state-of-the-art to an applicable level the involved city partners invest into lighting test fields. The first four periods were dedicated to the necessary planning procedures: analysing the lighting situation at the test fields, the impacts of different light situations on road safety and traffic, investigating users needs at the chosen sites and different possible variants of LED lighting. In between the partners met twice in cross-border planners workshops to exchange their know-how and compile it for further dissemination. Five installations were finalised by the end of 2011. Light performances & opening events were organised for the general public to experience the new LED technology in real and on the spot. In the beginning of 2012 evaluation will be done by measuring energy saving effects, lighting effects, benefits for users and technological performance. The third workshop took place in Nov. 2011 in Oskarshamn, Sweden. The partners presented their finalised installations and exchanged first evaluations on the installation process and feedbacks from local authorities and general public. In the last period the situation analysis as well as the joint study on potential LED technology could be finalised and completed. Partners completed their installations and developed a draft for new financial models for implementation of LED technology in city & road planning to find selling arguments towards decision-makers in cities. Unfortunately the installations in Kalmar have been delayed which was caused first by internal discussions in the municipality about the installation site and secondly delayed deliveries from one supplier. This caused correspondingly the delay of the demonstration of the test installations and also the evaluation. Furthermore the drawing of categorical conclusions when it comes to new financial models and selling arguments could not be finalised during the project lifetime. For detailed explanation of the delay please see: "AR4 - Further information"