County decides to turn off lights

Powys started turning off two-thirds of its street lights

Pembrokeshire councillors have voted in favour of becoming the second county in Wales to switch off non-essential street lights after midnight.

The county council's cabinet was asked to back the energy-saving move, which could save about £213,000 a year.

Last month Powys began extinguishing 9,380 of its 14,000 lamps but the decision has proved controversial.

Some of Pembrokeshire's street lamps will be dimmed between midnight and 0530 after a new system is installed.

Town centres and areas covered by CCTV, pedestrian crossings and trunk roads will not be affected.

Council engineers estimated it would take two years to install programmable photocells to allow the lights to go out at the set times but after that there would be an annual saving of £213,315.

A campaign has been launched in Powys calling for lights to be left on in crime "hotspot" areas.

Montgomeryshire MP Lembit Opik criticised the switch-off, saying it would plunge the county into "18th Century blackness".

But a number of other local authorities in Wales are also considering the move.