HomeMy WebLinkAbout0015_5_Purchase Sale Agreement - Exhibit D Observatory LetterPALOMAR OBSERVATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECI-iNOLOGY
P.O. Rox 200 / 35899 Canfield Road Palomar Mountain, CA 92060
Telephone (760) 742-2100 / Fax (760) 742-1728
ssu O.Callech.edu/piflomill
January 10, 2017
Tyler Masters
Program Manager
W RCOG
Riverside, CA 4080 Lemon St, 92501-3609
Dear Tyler,
I am writing you today on behalf of Palomar Observatory to express our support for your initiative
regarding the Riverside County Regional Streetlight Program that seeks to replace 63,000 streetlights in
the County with full consideration of all stakeholders. Further I wanted to express our gratitude for
including us in the discussions of this initiative: you and your team were very gracious to include the
Observatory among the interested parties in this initiative.
Under your leadership, the assembled stellar team consisting of Riverside and Hemet staff, the
engineering consulting of Christian Monrad, James Benya, and Jim Filanc, who are well versed in the
issues concerning artificial night sky brightness, created and implemented a series of night street scenes
and information packets that helped inform participants in your tour groups and produce relevant
survey results. On three tours that I attended, I witnessed the professional manner which the tours were
conducted. Your novel use of QR codes placed on demonstration light poles allowing the public to enter
survey data with smartphones is truly innovative.
Palomar Observatory has been, and continues to be an internationally prominent astronomical
observatory, producing world class science and cutting edge innovation in instrumentation and data
processing. The Observatory is focused on discovery and follow-up as a matter of principle intent. Our
48 inch Samuel Oschin Schmidt Telescope with its wide -field capabilities surveys the sky, and interesting
objects it finds are then analyzed in detail by the Hale 200 inch telescope, the largest in the world for the
four decades after its construction. The Observatory is world renowned for the design and engineering
of its construction, in the days before modern computer-based methods were available. Today the
combination of Palomar Observatory, Caltech, JPL and other partners continues in the tradition of
cutting edge research. In partnership with the US National Science Foundation we are developing a
state of the art 10 Million dollar camera system that will be able to obtain hundreds of images per night
with a quality far exceeding historical photographic techniques. Modern data processing and machine
learning methods will yield an unprecedented discovery rate, and the collected data harvested by an
international science team. The Observatory also continues to equip the 200 inch Hale and 60 inch Oscar
Mayer telescopes with modern instrumentation and from collaborations that make the highest use of
these systems and resulting data. Included with this letter is a copy of a statement from the National
Science Foundation outlining why Palomar Observatory continues to be a national strategic investment
in the US science portfolio
We believe our common interests in the control of Riverside County night sky brightness are well -
aligned. Your leadership in Riverside County lighting strategy clearly serves public safety, nighttime
environment, and environmental sustainability objectives for county residents. That these shared goals
can also lead to reduced sky brightness for astronomy research and public enjoyment is a positive
alignment of our interests. Riverside County residents will be able to take pride in being responsible
stewards of the environment and in their partnership with the Observatory in exploring humankind's
connection to our universe. Your effort to help others appreciate and balance needs of community
with the impact of night lighting will allow the Observatory to continue producing world class science
that will inspire generations to come and makes all involved, a member of the extended Palomar family
We urge you to consider promoting using lights with the lowest blue content, color temperatures less
than 3,000K, and the use of distributed controlled dimming to enhance public safety, reduce energy
costs and extend the life of the LEDs. The ability to dim allows the use of condition dependent
brightness programming to balance the needs of the County with the reduction of artificial night sky
brightness and can aid law enforcement and public safety.
Sincerely,
`/.�_ _
Dan McKenna
Palomar Observatory Scientist