As one the world main consumers of electricity, the energy cost of street lights attracts more and more attention from environmentalists all over the world. The solar street lights cut the cost of street lights by produce electricity for lighting.

And the solar street lights are getting more and more popular in some great events, for example, the world EXPO and World Cup. May 25 (IANS) When thousands gather at the new stadium in South Africa's Cape Town next month for the football World Cup, authorities will make sure they know the lights are being powered by wind energy.

'We're using this major sporting event to focus on the environment,' UN Environment Program chief Achim Steiner said here Monday after the start of the assembly of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) -- a meet that takes place once every four years and where it is decided how countries will spend the millions of dollars now available for green projects.

How exactly are they doing that? 'We're retrofitting street lights, traffic lights and billboards to make them more efficient and also using solar panels to light up parts of the venues,' Robert Dixon of the GEF secretariat said.

'It's not that climate change and biodiversity are out there somewhere and over here we play football,' Steiner said at a press conference. 'Global warming and loss of biodiversity affect us all. That's why we are bringing these issues to the stadiums.'

But how does that square with South Africa getting a huge World Bank loan to build the world's fourth largest coal-fired power plant, since coal is the most polluting way to produce power? 'We had to go for this short-term solution due to the power shortage,' Faqir said. Steiner hoped this would 'be the last time South Africa is forced to take such a decision'.