Earth Hour
Tonight, from 7.30-8.30 pm is Earth Hour in Sydney. Individuals and businesses are encouraged to turn off all non-essential lights for an hour in a symbolic gesture of commitment to reducing climate change.
This campaign (jointly conducted by WWF and SMH (=Sydney Morning Herald, a major Sydney newspaper), with the support of the City of Sydney and the NSW Government) aims to raise awareness of simple ways of reducing electricity usage and has set a target of lowering Sydney's carbon emissions by 5% in 2007. Here are some simple suggestions to get you started.
Twelve points for the location from which this photo was taken.
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13 comments:
arggh I feel funny about earth hour and other 'soft green' approaches. Maybe it will help people get their head around some of the big issues. maybe, I don't know. but I do know that turning off our lights for one hour is not going to stop/alter climate change. The shift that will have to happen is HUGE and involves so much more than lights and carbon offsets (I've not heard anything more silly than "offest you carbon emissions by planting a tree" - maybe a whole amazon would do the trick...)
anyway cynicism aside if the aim of earth hour is to educate/raise awareness - yay! but i worry about the "I've done my bit" responce...
we'll be shining bright over at our house - well as bright as our solar 12 volt will allow...
The Royal Botanic Gardens?
I'm going to be more specific and say on the Mrs Macquarie's Chair peninsular.
The angles are all wrong to be the Gardens, unless it's right at Mrs Mac's Chair as Jonathan suggests. I can't think of anything better, unless you were on a boat!
We're mostly dark at church stuff tonight, but I confess to feeling the same as Rachel...as I drove past all the streetlights which must have enough wattage for my whole house in each of them...
I clearly got the message that the purpose of earth hour was not about the (negligible) savings made in that hour but to raise awareness of the ways Sydney might cut carbon emissions by 5% in 2007 (presumably as the first step towards larger changes). I guess pushing the question from my previous post further: if people can change, is it a journey of a thousand miles beginning with a single step or a death and resurrection kind of experience when they do? Or put another way: do some people experience (metaphorical) death and resurrection in a journey that feels like a thousand miles of single steps?
Oops - I meant to say that I got that message (that earth hour was symbolic), but I wonder how many missed it? Listening to conversations about it on the bus tonight, a sample of four all seem to have missed it.
I was driving over the bridge at 8pm tonight and noticed the difference -
I was slightly disoriented for a few moments!!
There were definitely a lot less lights on in the city - esp some of those big office buildings which are mostly empty at night.
"It's all a bunch of tree-hugging hippy contemporary rap."
Thank you, Cartman.
Blackwattle Bay?
Oh sorry - I forgot to arbitrate on the guesses. I'm going to give the points to Jonathan for being more accurate than Michael and earlier than Anthony. Sorry to those who missed out.
PS Hi Deb!
Guardian: WWF fund accused of failing adequately to regulate timber programme, leading to the WWF logo being used for corporate greenwash.
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