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60 Earth Hour - WWF Organises Hour of Darkness


Imagine if we could save 5% of all our Greenhouse emissions in only one hour? Well, the truth is that we can.

An innovative event called '60 Earth Hour' is going to acheive this. The event has been launched by the WWF (World Wide Fund For Nature) and ran in Sydney in 2007. This year, 14 cities around the world will switch off their lights. Contact your city council to be involved for 2009 and let's make this a truly worldwide event.

Well, you're probably thinking: "that's good and all, but how do you actually do it?"

Many people are now signing-up to turn their lights off for just one hour at 8pm on the 29th of March this year. Lots of companies and organisations have also agreed to do this and so if you're in Sydney on the 29th, you should be able to see the stars over the city (the bright haze from lights stops you seeing all but the brightest stars in the sky which is why big telescopes are put out in the middle of nowhere where there are no lights).

Obviously, it's not something practical that we could do all the time as just think of the accidents on the roads and sitting at home in the dark is only fun for so long! But it does make us think about the amount of energy that we use which could be saved. What about all those empty office blocks in the city...why on earth do they have their lights on all night? (See Freya's story on 'light pollution').

You can also log onto: www.earthhour.org/
There you you can register your commitment to turning off your lights on the 29th.

Light some candles or make your own!
What ideas can you come up with to make it fun? You could have some friends over and tell spooky ghost stories or have a candle-making session then light the candles during the hour. Share your ideas with us by emailing them to: theteam@planetpatrol.info and we'll publish them on the website.

Old technology eats electricity for breakfast, lunch and dinner
Buy energy-saving lightbulbs for your home and save


What will you do differently to save energy. Did you know that just switching electrical appliances off at the power point would cut electricity demand by up to 11 per cent? An easy-peasy thing to do is to go shopping with your parents then get them to stock-up on energy saving light bulbs. Bingo! An 80% saving in your family's power consumption for lighting! But make sure you don't put the 'CFL' (compact fluoroscent bulbs) in your normal rubbish bin at home as they contain mercury (see Alastair's story 'Energy Saving Lightbulbs')

If you would like to read more, check out these documents sent to us by the WWF:



Look out for an Earth Hour supplement being published in the Sydney Morning Herald on the 17th March and in The Age (Melbourne) on the 18th March. Apart from reading some really interesting stuff about Earth Hour, there should be a story written by Freya and I...woot, woot!


Story by Imogen Wadlow

References: SMH, 16 December 2006, 'Sydney leading light in hour of no power'.
Thank you to the World Wide Fund For Nature for images.
Ghost image from WebWeaver.