Earth Hour

'Earth Hour' was held on Saturday 29 March 2008. It originally started in Sydney in 2007.

The 2009 event has expanded - the organisers claim that 1,000 cities (some reports say 1,500) cities and towns across the world will take part.

This year it will be held on Saturday 28 March 2009 - at 8.30 pm.

Earth Hour is run by WWF (formerly the World Wildlife Fund which was then the World Wide Fund for Nature), a conservation organisation, and Fairfax Media (Age, SMH, etc). 
Organisers urged people - and businesses and governments - to turn off their lights for 1 hour from 8pm to 9pm on Saturday 29 March 2008.

Click here for the official Earth Hour website, where people can sign up their support. As well as asking people to turn off their lights for one hour, they are encouraging people to reduce their 'carbon footprint' and to spread the word!

Earth Hour started in Sydney in 2007 as a combined project of WWW, Fairfax Media and Leo Burnett for the city ofSydney. In 2008 it had spread to 26 cities plus many smaller locations around the world - the organisers claim 50 million took part.
They claim they want a billion people and 1,500 cities to participate in 2009!

How effective was it?
Claims have been made that 2 million people in Melbourne participated in 2008 - based on a nation-wide sample of under 4,000 people. And that power consumption was reduced by 10% for the hour.
After which time everyone turned all the lights back on!

People promoting the event were shown lighting candles and promoting that as an alternative energy source. However candles still burn carbon dioxide and also produce 'black carbon'. In Canada, one Fire Chief warned people NOT to use candles because of the risk of starting house fires. A WA fire officer warned people to be careful with candles for the same reason.

By 2009, some committed promoters of the notion of climate change were questioning the event. The Age (22/3/2009) reported that Clive Hamilton, climate campaigner and author of Scorcher: The Dirty Politics of Climate Change, says that "we are well past the time for feel-good exercises aimed at raising awareness ... it's like the band playing on as the Titanic sinks". There is a real danger that Earth Hour convinces people that we are making progress on climate change when we are not. And it lets business and government off the hook."

Religious support for Earth Hour
Some religious organisations - including Christians - are supporting Earth Hour.

The Baptist Union of Australia endorsed it in 2008 and in 2009 - urging people to participate - and quoting all the statistics claimed by the Earth Hour organisers.

The Australian Religious Response to Climate Change group (formed in 2008) endorsed Earth Hour and planned 'multi-faith vigils' in various Australian cities...

Some questions...
What was the effect? How many candles were burnt? What costs were involved in getting all those staff out there turning off lights at precisely 8pm?
What about the Earth Hour T-shirts?

Regardless of its aim or overall effect, the most telling comment I read was this:
"There was darkness - and we saw it was good."

Mmmm.... says a lot, doesn't it?
Perhaps man is thinking he is really God!

Andrew Bolt's column and blogs in 2009

Column - Earth Hour for the unearthed
Andrew Bolt Blog
Andrew Bolt - Herald Sun - Friday, March 27, 2009
"IT'S Earth Hour tomorrow, warming worriers - your chance to prove how much you don't care. For a start, you'll prove how much you don't care about being a hypocrite.
Last year people celebrated Earth Hour not just by turning off lights for an hour to "save" us from global warming gases. They celebrated also by burning forests of candles instead, and this year they'll go one better, by marking it during the Grand Prix, amid clouds of burning rubber and sacred exhausts. . ."

Earth Hour sponsors admit they're hypocrites
Andrew Bolt - Sunday, March 22, 2009
"Earth Hour next Saturday will see hypocrites turn off their lights for just an hour to show they care about global warming - which actually halted a decade ago, and which we can't stop even if it really was bad. . ."

Lights off, as are brains
Andrew Bolt - Friday, March 27, 09
"Professor Bjorn Lomborg finds another reason to wonder if Earth Hour worshippers have any idea what they are doing or why:
"When asked to extinguish electricity, people turn to candlelight. Candles seem natural, but are almost 100 times less efficient than incandescent light globes, and more than 300 times less efficient than fluorescent lights. If you use one candle for each extinguished globe, you're essentially not cutting CO2 at all, and with two candles you'll emit more CO2. Moreover, candles produce indoor air pollution 10 to 100 times the level of pollution caused by all cars, industry and electricity production."

Unearthed hour
Andrew Bolt Blog
Andrew Bolt - Thursday, March 26, 2009
Tim Blair checks which cities are doing what for Earth Hour:
Brisbane: Sir Richard Branson is hosting the Charity Hangar Ball during Earth Hour, a candlelit dinner for 3,000 at Brisbane Airport . The carbon-neutral event will feature performers Marcia Hines, Rogue Traders, Evermore and Housequake.

Andrew Bolt articles in 2008:

Earth Hour should be grounded | Opinion | News.com.au
28 Mar 2008 ... THE Earth Hour crusade proves that what threatens us is not so much global warming, but lousy journalism, writes Andrew Bolt.

Earth Hour crashes to Earth | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog
March 2008.

Media Reports:

City sees light in the darkness
Sunday Age, 30/3/2008.

Melbourne makes our darkest hour perfectly clear with 10% cut
The Age, 31/3/2008.

Race dims Earth Hour spirit
The Age - 25 Mar 2009
SEVERAL big-name Melbourne restaurants that signed up for Earth Hour last ... If there's some kind of economic advantage to putting the grand prix on at ...

For an alternative view, read Andrew Bolt:
Earth Hour coverage should be grounded
Herald Sun, 28/3/2008.

Media coverage as at 31 March 2008
Google News listed 1203 articles.
Click here.
Happy reading!
________________________________________

Now for those questions...

What about the candles?
In one story a lady was shown burning 28 candles to promote Earth Hour - Tim Blair quotes a letter to the SMH stating that she was "creating more than four times the CO2 supplied by coal power to light one old-fashioned 100-watt bulb for an hour".
Plus one has to make the candles, transport the candles, get oneself to the venues (if assembling in a public place) to burn the candles etc, etc.
Earthers Burn, Tim Blair, 20/3/2008.

Click here for an interesting analysis for Tasmania - comparing light globes and candles.
Tasmania has mostly hydro power - if you live in Tasmania, using a 100W globe was three times more efficient for emissions than burning a paraffin candle for an hour!

Earth Hour organisers did suggest burning beeswax candles as they are more environmentally friendly - "smoke free, non-toxic and non-allergenic".
[They still give off carbon dioxide].
Apparently candles you buy at the supermarket are generally made of paraffin . . . they are made from petrochemicals and contain some really nasty chemicals that are carcinogenic!

Professor Lomborg notes:
"When asked to extinguish electricity, people turn to candlelight. Candles seem natural, but are almost 100 times less efficient than incandescent light globes, and more than 300 times less efficient than fluorescent lights. If you use one candle for each extinguished globe, you're essentially not cutting CO2 at all, and with two candles you'll emit more CO2. Moreover, candles produce indoor air pollution 10 to 100 times the level of pollution caused by all cars, industry and electricity production."

What about the hot air balloon used to promote 'Earth Hour' in Sydney?
"An average one hour balloon flight uses approximately 180-200 litres of propane, which burns to form water and carbon dioxide; in addition to the fuel used by the balloon's ground retrieval crew. The activity to launch and retrieve one hot air balloon uses the equivalent of 378.1 kilograms of greenhouse gas."
That is from a hot air balloon company (to justify that and ease the conscience of those using taking balloon flights they are planting trees to be 'carbon neutral'. One of Andrew Bolt's readers noted this was equivalent to Nearly 10,000. 60W light bulbs being used for one hour.
Hot gospellers decry heat
Andrew Bolt - Thursday, March 20, 2008.

Those Earth Hour T-Shirts . . .
World Wildlife Fund was selling 'Earth Hour' T-shirts at $29.95 posted.
And people were wearing them!
Now people have been selling T-shirts to promote events for a long time - there is nothing wrong with a bit (or a lot) of publicity!
But recently I read that it takes thousands of litres of water to make a cotton T-shirt: estimates vary from 27,000 litres to 10,000 litres (this one added an extra 20,000 litres of water for the production of 1 kg of raw cotton fibres).
Add to that the energy used for production, the use of pesticides, transport etc... it by truck or...

So if the aim is to save the planet, can't we ask 'How much carbon dioxide is produced, how much water is used?'
Just asking!