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Why Earth Hour Is a Waste of Time and Energy
An anonymous reader writes "Next Saturday from 8:30PM to 9:30PM EST is 'Earth Hour' (0:30 to 1:30 UTC on Sunday). Millions of people will be participating by shutting off their lights for an hour to show they care about the environment. However, according to this article in Slate, Earth Hour is simply 'vain symbolism,' and it won't actually save any energy — quite the opposite. Quoting: 'Notice that you have not been asked to switch off anything really inconvenient, like your heating or air-conditioning, television, computer, mobile phone, or any of the myriad technologies that depend on affordable, plentiful energy electricity and make modern life possible. If switching off the lights for one hour per year really were beneficial, why would we not do it for the other 8,759? Hypothetically, switching off the lights for an hour would cut CO2 emissions from power plants around the world. But, even if everyone in the entire world cut all residential lighting, and this translated entirely into CO2 reduction, it would be the equivalent of China pausing its CO2 emissions for less than four minutes. In fact, Earth Hour will cause emissions to increase. As the United Kingdom's National Grid operators have found, a small decline in electricity consumption does not translate into less energy being pumped into the grid, and therefore will not reduce emissions. Moreover, during Earth Hour, any significant drop in electricity demand will entail a reduction in CO2 emissions during the hour, but it will be offset by the surge from firing up coal or gas stations to restore electricity supplies afterward.'"
But I couldnt find my keyboard in the dark
I thought Earth Hour was about reducing light pollution?
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
It's environmentalism theater, just like we have security theater. If I turn out the lights for an hour I can say I've done "my part" to help the environment and raise awareness then go back to ignoring it the rest of the year.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Like most, if not all other enviromental efforts, it's all about talk and symbolism, and very nearly nothing about actually doing the math...
The point of Earth Hour is public awareness, to get people talking, thinking, discussing solutions. To experience one solitary hour without electricity exposes westerners to the daily hardship that billions around the world face due to lack of electricity. I'm here in Egypt, they currently have a 20% electricity generation deficit. This means that even though I may live in one of the best neighborhoods in Cairo, I experience low-shedding 1 hour every second day. My Earth Hour is every second day! So, can the hipster who doesn't have a clue who submitted this story, pull his head out of his self-important ass? You're either part of the problem, or part of the solution. Bitching about awareness of the inequality in the world as being a waste of time is being part of the problem.
If it was truly pointless and wasteful, as an American I'm pretty sure I would have heard of it before now.
Likely as not, it would save more energy, and certainly help with human internal clocks.
From what I understand, they actually observer statistically distinct spikes in heart attacks and suicides with the time changes each year.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Only a politician would think you could cut a foot from one end of a blanket, sew it to the other end, and have a bigger blanket.
Forget CO2 levels. This is a helpful excuse to rendezvous with your lady/fellow and figure out *some* way to amuse yourselves for an hour in the dark. "Hey, it's for the good of the planet. Or whatever."
"Saving the Earth," sounds better than "Saving ourselves," even though the later is plainly more honest on any environmental issue you care to name.
well instead of developing the green tech to compete we must artificially increase the cost of the dirty fuel! we cant use plain old light bulbs anymore, that use more power (and give off heat, thus meaning one could in theory keep their heater lower) and now we are stuck with CFLs that are worse for the environment than the old bulbs!
You should have stopped before this sentence.
Insofar as "cheap" "dirty" vs "expensive" "clean" environmentalism is concerned, the problem is that it is difficult to capture (i.e., within a product's price) the cost of all the externalities ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality ). Therefore, we have "cheap" "dirty" fuels, which are actually more expensive than the clean fuels, but the costs of all of their negative externalities have not been included, and therefore only perceived as cheap by the average individual. For example, super-fine particulate matter (i.e., 2.5 microns in diameter), most commonly generated as a fuel combustion byproduct, is a serious contributor to adverse health effects and mortality rates; these health & life effects do translate into costs, though they aren't currently well-reflected in the prices of the products and/or energy choices you can select.
Therefore, we raise the cost of these "dirty" energy sources through artificial means in an attempt to better account for the non-artificial (but hard to encapsulate) externalities.
My area was hit by Hurricane Sandy in November and my electricity was out for a week! I think I've given my hour for quite a few years!
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
That is because the average person cannot in any way dent trans oceanic shipping burning bunker oil, or stop the americans and chinese from burning tonnes of coal per second. Of course its symbolic. Symbols are the only way for the average person to focus in on these earth sized problems. Christmas does not bring "good will to all mankind", however it may be enough to focus in on goodwill in your own life. Thus symbolism can bring a certain focus on the individual level to get people thinking about all the energy we use every day and what it would be like if it one day shut off / became unaffordable and we really did have to go without.
Symbolism is very important here precisely because we cannot do anything meaningful on an individual level to combat global climate change. It's all we have. I have never believed that one person giving up their car, or consuming no boxed foods makes a difference globally. I do not think that actual reduction in emissions is the idea behind earth hour. I think people that make that judgement are missing the point of it. Same as "buy nothing" day. Stuff will still get bought by someone, that's not the point, its symbolic.
*flame hat on*
As a potential lottery winner, I totally support tax cuts for the wealthy
Turning off air conditioning or heat for one hour will accomplish absolutely nothing. As soon as it is turned back on it still has to move or generate all the heat energy over that hour it would have otherwise. Simply put, it will have to work a little harder to catch up what it would have been doing over that hour anyway. Same with hot water heaters, dehumidifiers, refrigerators, etc. Merely putting off washing clothes, cooking, etc obviously accomplishes nothing either.
Better known as 318230.
One of the reasons "dirty" tech is cheaper is because you're making other people pay for the consequences of your actions. I could save myself some money on trash pickup if I just throw all my trash into my neighbors yard, but as a society we've decided that you're not allowed to shove your problems onto other people like that. We're not artificially raising prices, we're just making people pay for what they're already using.
Is 1563649 a prime number?