Light pollution is an ever-growing problem worldwide. Light pollution is the negative effects of artificial light at nighttime. This is becoming a growing concern because light pollution leads to increased electricity costs and energy waste, disrupts nocturnal species, and limits our ability to see the stars in the night sky to name a few.

Migratory birds use the stars and moon to navigate during their nighttime journeys, and bright city lights confuse them. This causes billions of bird deaths each year from collisions with illuminated buildings and windows. Fireflies, whose bioluminescent signals are essential to finding mates, are increasingly drowned out by artificial light, threatening their ability to reproduce and contributing to population declines. American toads and other amphibians are also affected, as artificial light disrupts their nocturnal foraging, mating calls, and migration to breeding sites. Artificial lights also attract and trap insects in unnatural congregating patterns, disrupting the food web for bats and birds that depend on them.

For these reasons, there is a movement to adopt more night-sky friendly practices. These include changing outdoor lights that remain on at night to ones with a lower color temperature (below 2,700K, i.e., lights that are more yellow/amber in color), using light fixtures that direct the light toward the ground, and using energy-saving features such as timers or motion sensors so that the lights do not remain on all night. These are relatively simple steps that College Park residents can take to reduce their carbon footprint and ease some of the light pollution burden on local nocturnal species.