YORK'S Christmas lights are set to go green, giving the city its brightest and most energy-conscious Yuletide ever.

In an environmentally-friendly move that sets a challenge to the rest of the UK, York will be the first city to have its Christmas lights powered by renewable energy.

York already boasts an enviable environmental record, and is currently hosting the year-long energy efficiency campaign PlanetYork, run in partnership by the Energy Saving Trust, the City of York Council, the Evening Press and local partners.

The latest move aims to spread the message even further as an estimated 400,000 people visit the city in the run-up to Christmas.

The festive scheme, a nationwide first, is sponsored by electricity provider npower, which is stumping up £30,000 towards the cost of the lights.

City of York Council and traders are also contributing to the display.

The lights will be powered by electricity from Juice, a joint venture between npower and Greenpeace, which harnesses wind at sea to supply up to 50,000 electricity customers in the UK.

Matthew Thomas, spokesman for npower, said: "In supporting the PlanetYork campaign, and running the York Christmas lights with renewable energy, we want to inform people that by opting to use clean electricity, we can all make a real difference in helping the environment.

"Choosing to go green can be easy, and at the same cost as your ordinary electricity tariff. But people often don't know how to go about it, so the York Christmas lights gives us a great chance to help."

npower has been working closely with the First Stop York tourism

partnership, which includes local businesses, shops and City of York Council, to plan and design the Christmas city lights, which will be officially switched on on November 15.

Sally Slack, retail representative from York Chamber of Commerce, said: "So many local people have been working hard to bring these lights to reality, and now they're here. It really helps to make York the number one destination in the region for Christmas shopping and entertainment this year."

Until construction of the Juice wind farm is complete in 2003, supplies will flow from existing wind sources and a hydro plant based in North Wales, which uses the plentiful natural supply of water to generate electricity.

Louise Collins, from PlanetYork, said the project was a real opportunity to let people know how they could change their lives and become energy efficient.

She said: "It's the first time that all the local businesses, shops, City of York Council and all the attractions have come together to plan and design the lights.

"That in itself is a first, because the lights haven't really been that impressive in the past.

"But it's also not such a concern that we are wasting energy and affecting climate change just for lights at Christmas, because the energy we will be using is renewable. This shows that you don't need to go back to the Dark Ages or make that big a change to your life to be energy efficient, you can just go about things in a different way."

Further details about the official switch-on of York Christmas lights will be issued closer to the time.

In the meantime, York residents wishing to find out more about Juice can log onto www.npower.com/juice or call the hotline on 0800 316 2610.

Updated: 10:56 Thursday, November 01, 2001