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Earth Hour - lights out, minds alight

This global lights out event will start Saturday night at 8:30 p.m. local time in New Zealand’s Chatham Islands and then follow the time zones around the globe, ending with an hour of darkness in the South Pacific island of Samoa almost 25 hours later.

Some of the iconic buildings around the world scheduled to go dark during Earth Hour include: the Eiffel Tower in Paris, the Empire State Building in New York, the Sears/Willis Tower in Chicago, the Space Needle in Seattle, the Sydney Opera House in Australia, and both the National Cathedral and the Smithsonian Castle in Washington, D.C.

Nice gesture, but what can I do?

Its good to see people thinking about the environment and what their impact on it is, but at the end of the day, this is only one hour - so people need to act in their day to day lives in a way which is more environmentally friendly. For instance:

• In the house - Improve the thermal characteristics of your house to reduce heating and cooling costs. Get more efficient at how you use water.
• Going on holiday? - look at how you can minimize your impact.
• Having a party - think about how you can make the party more green.

Basically, there is a lot you can do in your day to day life to reduce your impact on the environment - do not leave it to just installing solar cells and carbon trading, they are actually pretty 'weak' compared to the impact of changing your habits on mass, due to the ripple effect they create in the economy.



For more coverage see:

• Turn Off Your Lights for Earth Hour
• Lights out for Earth Hour
• Earth Hour Corporate Greenwash