Earth Hour!

Most of my blog over the last couple of months or maybe three has been about the weather. The changes and the ways to deal with it. The reason for the change has been purely due to our own neglect and the abuse of the environment and our natural resources. In 2007, the people of Sydney, Australia took it in their own hands and made a difference by powering down for an hour between 8 - 9 pm. This initiative was followed in 30 countries this year and I was proud to be part of it too.

What worked for the Aussies last year was applied across the globe in several cities and Toronto was one of the leading participants. Over the last few weeks the hype has been great and even the local Brampton newspaper stressed the importance of it. So my wife and I decided that we must contribute to it. We powered down all our non essential lights and electrical equipment at 8 pm.

There were several things planned for people to do during this hour and it was amazing to see the CN Tower power down as well as several buildings downtown turn off their lights. There was a concert at Nathan Phillips square with Nelly Furtado performing an acoustic concert. It is a small step toward a great savings for the future. There are simple things that we can to do on a daily basis to save more energy by switching off unnecessary lights, doing our laundry with cold water and driving at posted speed limits.

We hoped that our neighbours would be a part of the initiative. Unfortunately, Earth Hour was not welcomed by as many people as we thought on our street, we hope though, that there will greater acceptance of this in our locality and across the world in the years to come.