Friday, March 28, 2008

Earth Hour

I was doing a bit of idle surfing on the old 'net last night and stumbled across Earth Hour. Earth hour is an initiatie that started in Sydney, Australia last year with people wanting to do something to bring about awareness of our massive use (and waste) of energy.

"On 31 March 2007, 2.2 million people and 2100 Sydney businesses turned off their lights for one hour - Earth Hour. If the greenhouse reduction achieved in the Sydney CBD during Earth Hour was sustained for a year, it would be equivalent to taking 48,616 cars off the road for a year."

That's quite an amazing fact, just by switching off one light! Just think of all of those lights that you leave on when you're not in the room because you can't be bothered to switch them off, all those phone an laptop chargers left on constantly even when not in use.

I make no secret of the fact that I started using cloth nappies on J because I just couldn't see how we could afford to have two babies in disposable nappies, the enviromental benefits, to start with, weren't as important to me at the time.

Well, maybe if people thought the same about leaving lights and other electrical appliances on when they are not being used; make the issue more personal, forget about the enviromental issues for the minute, if you like. What about the effects on your pocket; imagine the old electricity meter spinning around. Maybe that might make you stop the wastage and stop standing with the fridge door open (my pet hate in our house!) while you see if there is anything good to eat.

I'll be switching the lights off tomorrow night. Who's in?

2 comments:

Daisy said...

Oops, I'm too late. But have you heard of Green Thing?
http://www.dothegreenthing.com/
You get lots of ideas for green things to do, with fun videos to illustrate them...

BabyLongLegs said...

I'm too late too...... *shame*

Just amazing the amount of energy saved......it should be done on a weekly basis!

Love
Sarah xXx