I imagine its not too high. Perhaps in the 800mw range, anything above that could risk the diode's life time (this is important considering how this is supposed to be used every night). It looks like it couldn't be more then a watt, and it seems to be closer to half a watt of output, judging by the beam and spot brightness. It's hard to tell, though, and every camera picks up 445nm differently.
Its pretty cool I drive by it from time to time. It's not as bright as I expected. From Interstate 4 my 35 dollar "200mw" can sit next to the blue dot and looks much brighter.
That looks to me to be a nice gas laser, perhaps a high watt Argon. That's something that you could leave on from sunset to midnight without fail.
Pretty cool, ((political rant)except the comment that it was done without permits, yet another face of government bending law to yield popular favor.)
Thanks for sharing though, it's great to see lasers used in this manner. Hopefully these types of displays will volley favor for future laser legislation.
Yeah I agree, looks more like an argon laser of sorts to me. Also much higher power than 800mW, you wouldn't be able to see a beam from that power with any form of sunlight around.