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Jessica Rinaldi / Reuters
Photos show the Empire State Building before and during Earth Hour in New York on March 27, 2010. Countries around the world have signed up for Earth Hour from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m. local time Saturday, during which homes, office towers and landmarks will turn off their lights to raise awareness about climate change. Click on the image to see an Earth Hour slideshow.
Cities around the world are going dark on Saturday night for the annual Earth Hour event, which aims to raise awareness about actions people can take for the environment's sake.
The campaign, now in its fourth year, boasting participation of more than 4,000 cities in 131 countries and territories around the world. Hundreds of millions of people are expected to turn off their lights and other non-essential appliances for an hour beginning at 8:30 p.m. local time.
The symbolic act is expected to darken major landmarks around the world, including the Sydney Opera House in Australia, the Eiffel Tower in Paris and casinos on the Las Vegas Strip.
Beyond 60 minutes
This year organizers are putting an emphasis on actions that go beyond just 60 minutes of sitting around the dark and thinking good thoughts about the planet.
"Earth Hour is a chance for people and communities across the globe to join together with the common purpose of a sustainable future for our planet,” Andy Ridley, co-founder and executive director of Earth Hour, said in a news release. "This year Earth Hour asks people to commit to an action, big or small, for the coming year, taking Earth Hour beyond the hour."
The organizers have set up a special website, Beyond the Hour, for examples of what actions to take and where you can make a pledge of your own. Some ideas:
- Cut down on the use of plastics
- Convert your lawn to a vegetable garden
- Conserve water
- Ride a bike, take the bus, or walk instead of driving
What about human achievement?
If all this sounds like a sacrifice of hard-won creature comforts, you can join up with the Competitive Enterprise Institute's competing campaign, the Human Achievement Hour, which encourages people to leave their lights on "in appreciation for the inventions and innovations that make today the best time to be alive."
To participate, the free-market advocacy group suggests you "gather with friends in the warmth of a heated home, watch television, take a hot shower, drink a beer, call loved on the phone, or listen to music."
Over on GreenBiz.com, this anti-Earth Hour campaign is summed up as the "fight against the fight against climate change" and offers Web links that should let you can watch the rhetorical battle from a ringside seat.
Meanwhile, the Earth Hour organizers have succeeded in getting statements from world leaders on their participation in the event, ranging from U.N. General Secretary Ban Ki-moon to Colombian President Juan Manual Santos to British Prime Minister David Cameron, who said:
"Sharing responsibility holds the key to fighting climate change. It will be the choices we make as individuals which will mean the difference between success and failure. That's what Earth Hour is all about — millions of people coming together to switch off their lights, tackle climate change and protect our natural world."
Will you be one of the millions of people participating this year in Earth Hour? Weigh in with a comment below.
More stories on Earth Hour:
- Must-see slideshow: Earth Hour around the world
- Earth Hour to hit major tourist draws near you
- Million unplug for Earth Hour
- Earth Hour around the world
- Lights out for climate change
- Sydney to San Fran: Lights dim in Earth Hour
John Roach is a contributing writer for msnbc.com. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by hitting the "like" button on the Cosmic Log Facebook page or following msnbc.com's science editor, Alan Boyle, on Twitter (@b0yle).
Leave a Comment:
Not the greatest symbolism for a group that's always accused of being anti-technology.
The people who try to do something positive will always be criticized by those who don't. At least they are doing something to try to bring attention to a problem of which many of us are in denial. I have lived for just sixty years, an eye blink on earth's calendar, and have seen a very scary trend that cannot be sustainable. During this time the population of earth has almost tripled from about 2.5 billion to almost 7 billion. And to make things even worse, our impact on earth as individuals has also increased. Fortunately we have some very good minds trying to make progress to reduce our negative impacts that threaten our way of life. I wish them well and I hope we can all learn from them to make changes as needed. Or we can just stay in denial and claim they don't know what they are talking about.
Great fan of earth day. To get into the mood please see some more great Earth hour pictures at the below site:
The write future
Great fan of earth hour. To get into the mood please some more great pictures here:
this is beyond stupid
Isn't there an Earth Day already? why does it need an extra hour?
I don't see a difference in the photos..
Great, it would be on a weekend I have to work through...awesome. Hello, backup generator...
It might be cool if everyone did it. Most folks think that night is some horrible abomination that should be brightly lit, probably because they are afraid of it. I regularly see houses that have 4-5 mercury lights outside, but no people. After all, nighttime is scary. Best to drive away the demons with electricity.
The planet would fare better if all sexual acts were stopped for one hour.
Yeah. good luck with that...
Allegedly (I've not seen real research to back this up this notion), births show a peak, nine months after a significant blackout, so if anything, it's better to keep people awake and active as much as possible, to achieve that end.
This is a big fat hoax. Please tell me that people are not so stupid to believe that there is no more energy in this world. Earth will go on, but people will not. So, if you're living now, chances are you will be NO MORE no matter what YOU do or DON'T do. So! Love your cat, feed your soul, read the TRUTH, and live and let live. I said, LET LIVE
So, it's not obvious to you that this is all about having energy to maintain a technological civilization as we humans currently know it, and not about everything on Earth somehow 'running down?'
If that's not your point, they you've completely lost me. Civilization goes on beyond any one of us, too.
Except for nuclear, it all (including fossil fuels) comes from the Sun by some path, we know that. And even the Sun won't produce energy forever.
@randy
or the thieves and (turd)burglars :)
I, for one, will not participate. It is a worthless feel-good gesture for the mindless masses.
How many of them are still using incandescent light bulbs? How many of them drive their cars an extra year or so before replacing them? How many of them Xeroscape or otherwise use native plants in their yards? (I realize that many communities' zoning rules won't allow gardens in the front yard.) I could go on.
Please don't. Nobody gives a flying crap if YOU participated or not.
and everyone that turned a light off and lit a candle lived happily ever after and went to heaven. How about some common sense and turn some lights off in your home.
There is no pleasing the left. If everyone turned off the lights and lit candles, they would complain that the candles were causing global warming! The left is useless. Please go move to a leftist country and stay there. Just leave America alone...
Capitalism is the way! Free markets dictate what works and what doesn't. Free markets would make our economy thrive while keeping prices down and increasing our quality of life. Look, I am not against conservation. Everyone can conserve, but it will never be accepted while it is being forced upon us. Quit trying to take away our priviledges and our quality of life while trying to fill your own agenda.
This is such a stupid idea. Why don't they just turn the lights on an hour later than they normally would have? Now, they turn on the lights, off, then back on again using energy. One hour isn't going to make dent in the electric bill, much less the earth's feelings. If they were really gung-ho about it, the owners of these buildings would never turn the lights on.