Earth Hour

easter65

Well I'm gonna go now and get candles on and games ready for kids....Have fun guys and ENJOY...:D

starchild1972

Unless you have beeswax candle that you have produced yourself consider the following......
The energy used to produce the materials and the actual candles, plus the carbon emitted by the burning of the candles, the carbon miles as the majority would be imported....you have probably not made a jot of difference apart from making the power stations and sub-stations surge at switch on time.
Most candles are paraffin and stearin based. Stearin is a by product of the beef industry and parrafin is a mineral oil.
Soy candles are the result of rain forest clearing in Brazil and the other alternative is palm oil candles.

Best to burn a bulb or sit in the dark.

anudeglory

Ah, 'slacktivism' at its best!

MARTINS_DOLL

I've just received this in a thank you email from WWF...

ON BEHALF OF THE PLANET, WE THANK YOU!
Earth Hour 2009 was an amazing success and we wanted to thank you for your support.
Lights went out in 4,085 cities in 88 countries in what is being described as the largest demonstration of public concern about climate change in history.
Check out this amazing view of the world going dark at:
www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/03/earth_hour_2009.html

Thanks for turning out for Earth Hour 2009!
The Earth Hour Team
EarthHourUS.org

hula-hoops

Agree wholeheartledly with starchild.

Turning off the lights for one hour does nothing and using candles for that time is probably doing more harm than good. And what's the use of turning off the lights but still watching the TV? How about living without electricity completely for a whole day? We regularly do that.

I heard on the radio one woman saying she was surprised how quickly the hour passed without the TV (they had decided to turn the TV off also) and she had been worried that they would get bored so she had bought a pack of playing cards and a wind-up radio specifically for the hour!

We don't have a TV at all and we never get bored or need to go out buying packs of cards.

Maddie

I've just searched for earth hour and found this thread. I'm responsible for promoting environmental ideas for my office and have been asked to send round an email to say we will be supporting earth hour.

Problem is that I'm sitting on the 'gimmick' side of the fence, so was searching for inspiration to explain why it is a good idea.

Having said that I disagree with hula-hoops post above - perhaps the lady in question will have continued to regularly turn off the tele and use the cards/wind up radio. I guess thats my inspiration...

jimbo24168

This government go on and on about global warming yet every time I see an item on the news about the Houses of Parliament I see they are lit up like a christmas tree. Is it not about time they practised what they preach?

julie777

How about turning off ALL electrical gadgets for an hour. Find something more interesting to do than tv and computer. I'm all for doing this every week! Kids don't agree!
Also think government could turn the lights off at Houses of Parliament and Big Ben for the whole Winter when it's not important for tourism. Set a good example guys!

yinhong

Climategate anyone?

Search for Lord Christopher Monkton on YouTube.

Astrocat_2

Whilst I agree that turning off unnecessary lighting is a great idea, and leaving it off is even better, if the darkness at 8pm results in a retreat to the bedroom, and a rise in the world birthrate in 9 months time, we are going to be worse off. That is what happened after the Great Blackout in North America when the power grid collapsed.

The world population is already too big, the last thing we need is a sudden increase next December, over and above the so-called "inevitable" increase. One thought, the people with the most lighting to turn off, are generally those who have smaller families.