Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Social distancing greens worried about whether they should switch off Cable TV or their Internet devices for an hour.
Climate Change: Switch Off Or Save? Protecting The Planet Post Earth Hour
This Saturday it is Earth Hour. The World Wildlife Fund’s annual campaign that asks people to ‘switch off’ for an hour to show their support for protecting the planet.
It has never been more timely. With millions of us practicing social distancing and self-isolation our digital activities have increased exponentially. Streaming services such as Netflix have had to take measures to reduce the bandwidth their services use to keep us connected. The call to ‘switch off’ for an hour now applies to more than just lights.
A recent BBC documentary, Dirty Streaming found that the number one hit single Despacito had over five billion streams online – using as much energy as five African countries in an entire year.
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Read more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/mikehughes1/2020/03/27/climate-change-switch-off-or-save-protecting-the-planet-post-earth-hour/
I normally switch on all the house lights during Earth Hour, to celebrate mankind’s technological achievements, but this Earth Hour I forgot; from memory I spent most of Earth Hour 2020 figuring out what was wrong with my big freezer.
Turn off lights, feel good and no one notices or cares. Missed it again.
Earth Hour was the final straw for me and our local house arrest self help WhatsApp group. Being reassured how much better life was with clear canals in Venice and audible bird song since we crashed the world economy led me to ask the following question. ‘We were assured by Guardian that 130,000 have been killed by ‘austerity’ how will crashing the world economy help? I doubt that millions of women suffering lung damage and premature death from cooking over open fires would agree.’ I invoked the precautionary principle mindful of the beautiful carved misericordes in the parish church.