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Sunday, March 1, 2009

Earth Hour 2009, Vote Earth with the WWF!



Earth Hour is coming around again. In a few weeks, on Saturday March 28 at 8:30pm local time around the world people will be turning off their lights to show their support for action on climate change. It started in Sydney, Australia in 2007 and is now a global event.

Earth Hour won't make any significant impact on lowering CO2 emissions. It's a demonstration of how many people around the world are aware of the threat of rapid climate change and are taking action in their day-to-day lives to slow it down. Slowing down global warming is such a huge goal that it's easy to feel like one person's actions just don't make a difference. Maybe you're thinking about turning down the thermostat 2 degrees in the winter, spending $5000 to upgrade your home's insulation or $40,000 to install geothermal heating. It's easy to think: Why am I bothering? Is it really going to save me any money? Am I really going to be able to protect Richmond, B.C. or the Vancouver Airport by stopping the rise of sea levels*? I seem to be the only one on my block doing anything! Earth Hour makes it very clear that there are many individuals taking action all across the globe, the numbers are growing and the cumulative effect of all these actions is quantifiable and visible even when it is as simple an action as turning off your lights.

In Canada go to WWF-Canada Earth Hour to sign up so you can be counted. Last year Canada led the world according to the WWF with almost half the population participating!

If you are anywhere else in the world go to Earth Hour Global to sign up.

The Earth Hour Global page has a great map showing all the countries in the world currently scheduled to hold events for Earth Hour. But don't worry even if your country or city/town isn't listed you can still sign up. You could also call your mayor's office and tell them you'd like your city or town to participate. WWF also has suggestions for organizing your own event!

I signed up and I'd love to know if you did, so feel free to come back and say so in the comments section below.


*"Richmond, airport threatened by the sea" by Ken Meaney, Phil Couvrette and Kelly Sinoski, Canwest News Service; Vancouver Sun
Published: Tuesday, September 02, 2008