The Impact of Light Source Spectral Power Distribution on Sky Glow

The effect of light source spectral power distribution on the visual brightness of anthropogenic sky glow is described. Under visual adaptation levels relevant to observing the night sky, namely with dark-adapted (scotopic) vision, blue-rich (“white”) sources produce a dramatically greater sky brightness than yellow-rich sources. High correlated color temperature LEDs and metal halide sources produce a visual brightness up to 8× brighter than low-pressure sodium and 3× brighter than high-pressure sodium when matched lumen-for-lumen and observed nearby. Though the sky brightness arising from blue-rich sources decreases more strongly with distance, the visual sky glow resulting from such sources remains significantly brighter than from yellow sources out to the limits of this study at 300km.