Defuse Global Warming Together for an Earth Hour

By hiromiFeb 20th, 2008

It started with a question:

How can we inspire people to take action on climate change?

The answer:

Earth Hour, a global movement to turn off the lights for one hour between 8 and 9 p.m. local time, March 29.

It is one of those excellent example of the adage “think global, act local, start small”. First done in Sydney, Australia on March 31, 2007, 2.2 million people and 2100 Sydney businesses participated. This massive collective effort was said to curb Sydney’s energy consumption by 10.2% during the hour, which was equivalent to taking 48,000 cars off the road for one hour. Converting time to weight, an Earth Hour could be 25,000 tonnes, the weight of carbon dioxide kept out of the Earth’s atmosphere in this country that is heavily reliant on coal for electricity.

Sydney Opera House – every other night:

Photo by panoramio

Sydney Opera House – during Earth Hour 2007:

Photo by vankatwijk

Managed by WWF, this year’s Earth Hour will be joined by cities around the world. The eight latest cities to join “Earth Hour” are Atlanta, San Francisco and Phoenix in the US; Thailand’s capital Bangkok; Ottawa, Vancouver and Montreal in Canada and Dublin in Ireland. They join Australian cities Sydney, Perth, Melbourne, Canberra, Brisbane, Adelaide; Denmark’s Copenhagen, Aarhus, Aalborg and Odense; the Philippine capital Manila, Fiji’s biggest city Suva, Christchurch in New Zealand; Chicago; Tel Aviv and Toronto.

If participation rate in these cities matched Sydney’s last years’, 30 million people around the globe is expected to participate in 2008. It will be an international demonstration of the power of individuals to create change.

Prove that you want to be part of the solution by joining and spreading the word about Earth Hour 2008. Better yet, if you think you’re ahead of the pack, make Earth Hour part of your everyday life. Starting today.