Earth Hour
by Chris Tilley
Earth Hour Video (www.gogreentube.com)
5. Turn Off the Lights
It’s easy to see when we leave a light on – so just switch it off. And while you’re at it, switch all your light bulbs to Compact Fluorescents (CFLs). These new bulbs last up to seven times longer, and use much less energy than all others. While plugged in, all your other electronics are silently stealing energy. Power transformers we have for battery chargers can use a lot of energy even when they’re doing nothing. Rather than unplug them, why not put them all on a power strip you can easily switch off?
Earth Hour was started in 2007 in Sidney, Australia and 2.2 million people turned off their lights for one hour. Last year 50 million people around the world turned off their lights for one hour. This year the goal in for 1 billion people in 1000 cities to turn off their light for one hour.
So if every one of those people only turns off one light and it is and energy saving CFL bulb we will save 13,000 Mwh. The largest carbon dioxide emitting power plant in the US is the Scherer Power Plant.(source) They operate four 880 MW coal plants.(source) So that means that that 13,000 Mwh is equivalent to idling almost 15 of those 880 MW unit for an hour. Using the numbers from Carma, Scherer create about 1 tonne of carbon dioxide per Mwh. So that mean a savings of 13,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide. This a very conservative estimation
That is not really the point of Earth Hour. Earth Hour is about taking action and responsibility, of showing that we care about the earth. Its a powerful message to our leaders that we are concerned about global warming and the environment. Governments are taking notice, and a number have endorsed Earth Hour. Having 1 billion turn off their lights will be and incredible message for the whole earth to hear. A bonus for those kids in big cities this would be a great time to do some backyard astronomy. With the lights out the light pollution will be minimal.
Earth Hour is 8:30PM Saturday 28 March 2009. For more information and and to sign up go to www.earthhour.org