Andrea Giacomelli, promoter of the BuioMetria Partecipativa project obtained the 2019 “Dark Sky Defender” award by the International Dark Sky Association (IDA), the main organization worldwide committed to protection and promotion of the night sky.

This award is assigned to individuals or organizations in recognition of their exceptional efforts to promote and advance the mission and programs of IDA by promoting quality outdoor lighting to reduce light pollution and its environmental impacts.

Here is the motivation by IDA: For over ten years, Andrea Giacomelli has led the “BuioMetria Partecipativa” (Participatory Night Sky Quality Monitoring) project in Italy. The BuioMetria Partecipativa project has demonstrated a progressive approach, engaging not only “typical” subjects such as public administrations, utilities, or park managers, but triggering community-based activities, collaborations with artists, bartenders, and other segments of society who “thought they had nothing to do with light pollution”. Giacomelli organized more than 100 education and public outreach events.

The winners of the various IDA Award categories have been announced yesterday (Sep. 30) online, and the awards will be assigned on Nov. 8 in Tucson, Arizona, during the next IDA General Assembly.

Source: IDA

The lecture will be a 2.30 PM

Measuring the quality of the night sky is necessary to assess light pollution and to evaluate its trends. These derive from a combination of existing and new lighting installations, and the applications of mitigation actions to reduce the amount of luminous flux escaping the primary areas where lighting is needed (and thus generating glare and skyglow), and containing increasing levels of blue light due to the diffusion of new generation lighting. Such measures are especially important in relation to protected areas, where night sky quality measurements by digital cameras have become a routine procedure. However, these observations lack the wavelength dependence of sky radiance; therefore, we have started a spectral sky quality survey parallel with the all-sky radiance measurements. To interpret the measurements, we also performed Monte Carlo simulations with the dominant light sources in the neighborhood of the measurement locations. We studied the effect of the tendencies of different atmospheric conditions for some reference cases with typical cloud and aerosol profiles.  The structure of the aerosol layers has a significant impact on the night sky radiance distribution, and it is neglected in most of the recent light pollution modelling. I will present our first results obtained at the Zselic Starry Sky Park, in the context of a now fifteen-year-old program for the protection and promotion of the night sky in various nature reserves in Hungary.

The visit to Fondazione Mach is part of a tour in Italy with the BuioMetria Partecipativa project, active since 2008 in the interdisciplinary protection and promotion of the night sky.

Zoltán Kolláth, professor of astrophysics at the Savaria University Center, Eötvös Loránd University, Szombathely, Hungary between 24 and 29 July. Prof. Kolláth is one of the highest international authorities in the field of light pollution studies, as well as in the promotion of the night sky as a resource. He was the creator of one of the first international star parks in Europe, the Zselic landscape protection area, and has for many years been a driving force in protecting night skies in Hungary, with the recognition of three parks certified by the International Dark Sky Association.

At the moment, the professor is responsible for a large national project for the development of scientific research on all aspects of light pollution, including the creation of new sustainable lighting systems. As an astrophysicist, he deals with the dynamics of pulsating stars. He is also very active in the dissemination in this sector, for example taking care of the soundtrack of astronomical signals that have been used in exhibitions and musical compositions, including a piece by John Legend.

In the May 16 conference which we organised in Brescia with the BuioMetria Partecipativa project in collaboration with the University’s DICATAM on Interdisciplinary promotion and protection of the night sky, we had a very interesting talk on Italian Regional legislation by Maria d’Amore. Maria has been following this topic for over ten years working at the Emilia-Romagna regional administration, and among other topics she presented a table which we then invited her to share.

The table shows similarities and differences, with respect to various criteria, region by region (for those regions where light pollution regulations are present). This table is an extremely interesting reference both for experts, and for non-experts who may have an idea of how different administrations have been approaching the same topic in the course of time.Regions are listed according to a reverse chronological order related to the year of publication of the most recent law.

The table is updated to June 2019 and is currently maintained in Italian (we may consider translating the table if there are specific requests). For comments or for more information, please write to: bmp@pibinko.org