This is St. Michael¡¯s Mount. It¡¯s one of the most beautiful locations, I think, in Cornwall. Right now, at this location, we couldn't shoot much astrophotography here because the light pollution is too much in the background from the villages, from the town, from the street lighting.
A place like this really 3affects the natural world. Insects, 4moths, birds. It all has a 5knock-on effect.
Kevin Gaston, Professor of Biodiversity & Conservation, University of Exeter: Light has been used throughout much of 6evolutionary time 7as a measure of timing. And so, lots and lots of 8organisms have used that and now what we're doing is changing those natural cycles of light through the introduction of 9artificial light.
Organisms are using it to determine when they might flower, when are they going to 10reproduce, when are they going to 11migrate, when are they going to feed. So, we're 12fundamentally13 eroding, 14distorting those light cycles on an 15enormous scale. Dark Sky International is the leading organization internationally protecting dark skies, restoring dark skies where we've already lost them because of the introduction of artificial light.
Aaron Cherrie, astrophotographer: Let's bring up the light pollution map. This is the West Penwith dark sky location, which is a national dark sky site. And this is where I'll be going tonight to take our pictures of the 16Milky Way. This is probably the darkest skies we've got in the UK. We've all got to appreciate the night sky, even if it just means turning off your security light and going outside and standing out there for 10 minutes. You'd be surprised what you might see. And now we're ready to start shooting. So, this¡¯ll be a 15-second exposure at f/2.8 ISO 6400. Now that shows you how much light pollution is now coming from Penzance, a local town here.
Kevin Gaston: Lighting is one of those things that we can do something quite quickly about, both individually and corporately. Many of us have control over at least some forms of nighttime lighting, so reducing 17the spill of lighting outdoors. I think everybody can do their part in this.
