Earth Hour hopes to shed light on climate
So are the St. Louis Gateway Arch, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Eiffel Tower, Egypt’s Great Pyramid of Giza and many other iconic structures.
The lights will be going out for Earth Hour, organized by the World Wildlife Fund to draw attention to global warming, from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m. Saturday local time around the world. That’s when organizers of the event, which began in Sydney in 2007, want everyone to turn off non-essential lights.
About 2,800 cities in 83 countries — including 250 in the United States — had signed up, according to Dan Forman, a spokesman for World Wildlife Fund, an international conservation organization that boasts 1.2 million national members and close to 5 million globally.
Forman said organizers want to send a message to Congress and to global leaders working this year on climate change legislation and a treaty to limit greenhouse gas emissions blamed for global warming.
“It’s all about the symbolism,” he said. “We fully recognize that one hour does not put a dent in the climate crisis.”
The effort has its critics.
“We think Earth Hour, even if you are super-concerned about global warming, is a little lame, and we are making fun of it,” said Eli Lehrer, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), a Washington, D.C., think tank that supports limited government and decries global warming “alarmism.”
CEI has announced a “Human Achievement Hour” to counter Earth Hour. The group says millions of people will participate by turning the lights on, going to a concert or seeing a movie. “It’s obviously tongue-in-cheek,” Lehrer said.
Many companies, however, are serious in support of Earth Hour, Forman said. Coca-Cola, for example, has pledged to turn off its big signs around the world, including a marquee in New York’s Times Square.
Schools and universities across the country are also participating, including the University of Louisville.
“We are trying to change the cultural attitudes and behavior,” said professor Barbara Burns, chairwoman of the university’s Sustainability Council. “And one of the first steps is awareness.”
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Re Anna V
I totally agree. Doing it to symbolise an effort to reduce AGW is a crock of the proverbial. However if it is used to draw attention to the very sound practice of conserving limited and finite resources then great. For me I will be watching the Rugby League on the Telly (and charging my toothbrush !!).
Anthony Watts…
From your article:
Many companies, however, are serious in support of Earth Hour, Forman said. Coca-Cola, for example, has pledged to turn off its big signs around the world, including a marquee in New York’s Times Square.
I’d like to see Coca-Cola stopping its production chain around the world and the BBC et al silencing their broadcasts during that hour. Hah! I’ll ignore it completely. 🙂
“FatBigot (21:26:46) :
In the 1980s we were mugged by Band Aid and Live Aid to sort out food shortages in Africa. Well, what a huge success that was. Lots of old quasi-musical careers restored; massive appearance fees charged ever since by some of the loudest mouthes involved. And look at Africa, the same problems remain almost a quarter of a century later. ”
I will have to disagree with you there about Band Aid, and in particular, Ethiopia. Band Aid was, and still is, a great success. Ethipopia isn’t the dust bowl as portrayed back in the 80’s, it;s very fertile in fact. What Band Aid did, more than anything else, was to educate people that there really are better ways to do things, in particular, farming. There is still lots of corruption, lots of work still to be done, but attitudes are changing. I’ve been to Africa, Ethipoia, and seen Band Aid work firsthand, and it’s still working there. What I now see happening is large multinationals invading Ethiopia for it’s resources.
PS. My wife is Ethiopian and we married there too.
Earth Hour is a load of all hogwash, I’ll be doing what I usually do, I don’t need to participate in tokenism.
The reason for switching off floodlights etc should be to fight light pollution and for the return of the night sky (saving some money as well). And it should be done all night, every night.
Squidly (21:22:49) :
OT: Kind of an odd spec on the sun isn’t it? Can someone tell me what kind of spec/spot/tumor that is or what it is called?
NOAA Solar Wind Products Reports (SWPR) informed on a probable Class-B sunspot; however, few hours after, a new report confirmed that the solar disc “remained spotless”.
All lights appliances and electronics on here.
Modern Man’s existence is the story of triumph over darkness. It is a complete disgrace for humans to cringe in cowardly darkness given that we possess all of the knowledge to power our lives cheaply, cleanly and for centuries using uranium.
I will never submit. I’d rather live for only one more second than cater to the UN squads who seek to diminish our enjoyment and control our lives.
I wrote this yesterday
By the way, may I ask everybody here to support Earth Hour 🙂
I really mean it. Not for the daft climate change reasons, but to highlight that we do need to conserve energy and be as efficient as possible with our use of energy.
We’ve got a world that is, despite this recession, always developing. More and more are coming out of poverty and demanding use of electricity. The demand is growing while supply has problems because of partisan politics, activism and limited resources. This problem isn’t going to go away until we come up with a source of energy to replace everything we rely on today so we need to conserve energy whenever possible. Spreading out our use buys us time.
This is all politicians have needed to say to us, but instead they’ve chosen scare tactics and a method of maximising profits (carbon trading) from the dying breath of the carbon era.
So when someone asks you did you support Earth Hour, say yes and tell them your realistic reason for doing so while reminding them you don’t believe in the bogus reasons. Good idea for spreading critical thinking?
I understand everyone’s need to rebel, and there’s a big part of me that says screw Earth Hour. Hell, I used to live in Hollywood when the first one came along and hardly anyone there gave a toss about it apart from paying lip service to it and then consuming lots of power all year long.
But I hardly consume much in the first place. I believe in efficiency, not just in use of energy sources but in all areas of my life. So I’m going to support Earth Hour by having an hour’s nap. When one of those elitist bourgeois Champagne Socialist, Limousine Liberal, Caviar Left environmentalists ever asks me about my consumption, I’ll stick it to them for their hypocrisy. I’ve never met an environmentalist who is as economical, eco-friendly or efficient as I am. They talk the talk but can’t walk the walk.
And I will be going to the G20 protests on the 1st of April to cause disruption. I’m going to do my best to protect the police from protestors who want to pick a fight.
The 1kw ouside lights which light the neighbours yards as well as mine, and the 3 phase a/c unit (6hp) should do the trick in reverse cycle mode, although I’ll have to open the house up to release the excess heat into the atmosphere.
The silly part of this is that the grid will still need to be running at capacity, so no actual CO2 savings can be made (- if you really believe that makes a difference).
Disturbing to me is the fact that Wikipedia (Propagandapedia) will allow an entry for “Earth Hour” but is adamantly refusing to allow an entry for “Human Achievement Hour” (the opposite of Earth Hour).
If this doesn’t blatantly display their obvious bias, I don’t know what does.
What a joke. Just another example of why I disregard anything that comes from Wikipedia.
I am participating in Human Achievement Hour full bore!
“And don’t be such sissies about it, have Earth Week in Jan or Feb when the impact of having no electricity really hits home.”
Good idea Eve, but it started in Sydney 3 years ago (where it lack of impact was highlighted by a rival paper overexposing the image to look as if more lights were on!), the temperatures are in the mid 20’s C and we still have daylight saving. So not too much suffering here….sorry about the rest of the Planet.
The Paper in question produced a 24 page supplement with the usual gush about ‘vote for the earth by switching off’,’wars and hungry refugees could be some of the dire consequences of GW’, the obligatory Polar Bear photo op. ‘Polar ice is melting at such an alarming rate the rest of the world can’t help but feel the heat’, but surprisingly a quote from Nature on page 4,’2008 was the coolest year of the decade….’. The irony was lost on them.
This whole thing has a child-like ‘save the planet’ tone,and while energy conservation is indeed worthy ,it should reveal itself in dollar savings and not in religious fervour.
Flat screen plasma TV on the game, stereo cranking something loud and energetic, lights on. I am very tired of stunts designed to make me feel guilty about living. I garden organically and pay close attention to our power usage otherwise, but sometimes one must fly one’s flag.
I’ll be doing what I would normally do at this time of a Saturday evening. I’ll be out enjoying myself with my other ‘arf and our friends. With the lights on of course…
This is about population.
Remamber what happened the last time the lights went out?
Burn CANDLES people!!! The greenies don’t know this, but burning candlewax (C18H38) releases CO2 gas! So the candle campaigns just show how igorant these people are,, turn on your lights and make sure to build a lovely spring bonire to burn all the burnable remnants of the past dreadful winter…
Also wouldn’t it be interesting to point out (to those who claim to have “done their bit”) no decrease in CO2 concentration during and in the days after earth hour?? Just to show that even earth hour can’t stop runaway global warming 😉
Go onto the facebook earth hour page and you will see earth hour mugs, shirts, caps and other “earth friendly” produce for sale!
Note at the bottom of the page it reads.. ‘ a portion of the earnings will go toward conservation'(something to that effect)
A portion could be 20%, 1% or even 0.99%… the rest?? Into the moneymaker’s pocket of course! What a moneymaker, and the public is falling for it.
From Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound, written 2500 years ago.
CH =Chorus, PR = Prometheus.
CH. And didst thou chance to advance even beyond this?
PR. Yes! I prevented mortals from foreseeing their doom.
CH. By finding what remedy for this malady?
PR. I caused blind hopes to dwell within them.
CH. In this thou gavest a mighty benefit to mortals.
PR. Over and above these boons, however, I imparted fire to them.
CH. And do the creatures of a day now possess bright fire?
PR. Yes–from which they will moreover learn thoroughly many arts.
Squidly (21:22:49)
It’s a plage region, from the French word for “beach”. An almost-a-sunspot that a visible sunspot may or may not emerge from. If you look closely, there’s a weaker one at about the same latitude, just over into the right hemisphere, that has had a spot flash on and off for the last few days (but not for long enough to get an official number).
From Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
To sum it all up once more, the Paris gamin of to-day, like the
graeculus of Rome in days gone by, is the infant populace with the
wrinkle of the old world on his brow.
The gamin is a grace to the nation, and at the same time a disease; a
disease which must be cured, how? By light.
Light renders healthy.
Light kindles.
All generous social irradiations spring from science, letters, arts, education.
Make men, make men. Give them light that they may warm you.
A talk-back radio host here in Sydney, Australia had a knock on his door earlier this week. It was a neighbour asking to borrow some of his electricity. On Saturday night after Earth Hour, the neighbours plan to have a celebration of Earth Hour by having a party including floodlighting. He was stunned and asked her to repeat her request. Yes, they want to celebrate Earth Hour by using loads more electricity than they normally would by floodlighting a party (partly with power from his house). Through his disbelief and in the spirit of neighbourliness, he agreed. I think he then closed the door to shake his head and laugh. I do wonder if his neighbours can see the irony of their gesture. I doubt it. 😉
ALL JOKING APART… You do realize that this is a very good opportunity
to quantify the heating effect of the “old” light bulbs versus the “new” energy-
saving ones that will? be enforced globally in a few years…And with 100% insulated houses we get rid of most of the UHI effects…GREAT NEW WORLD…
Meanwhile POTUS B Obama chats with Jay Leno…[on YouTube 6 days before
coming to our “Kanal 5” in Sweden…(one week’s delay for TV…)] about…basket-
ball…Weather here is midwinterlike, of course SMHI proclaimed “meteorological
spring” March 8 up to Uppsala 72 km [45 miles] N of Stockholm, thats a bad
joke since we’ve had a thin snowcover (3-20 cm) all month (March) So
7 consecutive days +0.1, +0.3, +0.2 etc and then 20 days averaging -5C means
that winter is NOT reinstated…not after Feb 15….BTW World Cup qualification
takes place tonight…”OK folks, let us all observe an hour of energy saving so
we can have clean environmental records before we turn the 50” flat screen
on…”
All our exterior house/drive lights will be on and am just connecting a load of LED ropelights for more visual impact. If only I had some searchlights – they would be on too, lighting the Surrey Hills. Will be burning all U2/Bono, Leonardo de Caprio tapes/DVD’s………….Ah! Just found our neon Christmas Reindeers and sledge……… 🙂
Hi,
Check out Tim Blair’s blog. This was sent in for last years event.
“In honour of Earth Hour, my friends and I will be hosting the first annual Carbon Party. To mark this solemn occasion, we will be running the space heaters and air conditioning simultaneously, while putting loads of clothing through the dryer and turning all the incandescent lights on. Dinner will be grain-fed beef cooked over a wood fire (none of that clean LPG barbecue gas), served with imported vegetables shipped in from overseas (whether or not they can be found at the local farmers’ market). Bog rolls for the evening will be of softest five-ply tissue paper. ”
We now call it the “Hour of Power”
Earth Hour is either utterly irrelevant or hopelessly inadequate depending on whether you’re a sceptic or a Believer. Either way it should be ignored, and I’d suggest it’s actually the Believers who should be getting bent out of shape and condemning the whole charade (R18 for for my less than sweet language – but then I am an angry exile 😉 ). I reckon it was dreamt up to sell greenwash and Fairfax Media’s newspapers, and on that basis I’m not going to avoid buying carbon credits, a wind turbine and a bunch of solar panels. Equally I’m not going to fall into the trap of turning everything electric on and putting my bills up just to spite middle class non-thinkers who’ve fallen for the Earth Hour hype. It’s a normal Saturday night for me, though since the Melbourne Grand Prix and the Aussie Rules season has just started there’s 12 straight hours of watchable TV. And anyone who reaches for the remote at 8.30 is getting both barrels in the legs.
“What are you going to do for “Earth Hour”?”
Probably be getting taxed :
“…trillions of dollars in wealth transfer… new taxes… new tariffs and subsidies… complicated payments for greenhouse gas abatement…”
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,510937,00.html