Earth Hour – Lights OUT! – Help Save the Planet

As you know, the World Wildlife Fund is asking everyone, all around the world, to turn their lights out at 8:30 PM local time on March 28, 2009 to raise people’s awareness of our energy use. This is a great idea. Here are the reasons why:

1. Polar bears are dying due to global warming. This has been proven by Al Gore and others. Turning on lights at night (or during the day) can hurt the polar bears. Enough is enough.

2. Sea ice is melting at an alarming rate. Turning on lights at night (or during the day) can cause the sea ice to melt as we burn fossil fuels to power these lights. These fuels release prodigious amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, which then trap the sunlight’s warmth, and won’t let it go. The only people who will be helped by the rising sea levels are inland dwellers who will end up with oceanfront property they did not have to buy, but they are the only ones.

3. Climate change must be slowed down. Turning on lights at night (or during the day) can cause climate change to accelerate. Mankind lived for thousands of years without artificial lights. Why do we need them now? Even Native American Indians did not have lights and they lived in harmony with nature for centuries. Lights are bad, and if we can do without them for one dark hour, then why not do without them for many hours? It is worth it if we can save the earth.

4. We just experienced one of the coldest years on record — 2008 — and that was caused by global warming. Unless you power the lights in your house with wind, solar, or nuclear, then you are contributing to the very warming that is causing record cooling. The madness has to stop and Earth Hour is the first step.

5. Even lights on your car can cause global warming. How can that be? Well, to run your lights you need to use electricity. This is generated by the alternator in your car, which is turned by the engine in your car. To run the alternator takes energy to run the engine. Unless you have an all-electric car you are hurting the earth when you have your lights on. Turn them off March 28, 2009, for one hour, starting at 8:30 PM, whether in your car or at your house or your business.

6. All lights not off are on and are causing the earth to die. If you see lights on for Earth Hour, politely remind the owners of those lights to turn them off as they are hurting the earth, and because you live on the earth, they are hurting you, too. If they won’t turn them off, report them to the World Wildlife Fund immediately.

7. Earth Hour is not about saving energy (although it will save massive amounts of energy all over the world). It is about making people aware of the harm they are doing by using energy they simply do not need. If everyone made Earth Hour a part of their lives each day, it is estimated that we could save 3,000,000 railroad cars filled with coal each and every month worldwide.

8. Advertising wastes thousands of megawatts of electricity worldwide each day. If you see advertising that is electrically powered running on March 28, 2009, from 8:30 to 9:30 PM, you should stop patronizing that company. Simply put, just to get you to buy things you don’t need, these people are hurting the planet and all the beings on that planet. Involve your local Chamber to tell these businesses enough is enough.

9. Although Earth Hour is primarily a symbolic event, if enough people worldwide begin to turn their lights out each night, it will make a huge difference in how we all live. Astronomers could once again see the night skies, couples could walk in moonlit darkness and learn to love one another again, nocturnal animals could at least have a fighting chance at survival for one hour, power company employees could take a longer break each evening with the grid going slack each night, criminals could go about their business without expectation of being seen, early sleepers could fall asleep sooner, and it would become more of a video game-like challenge to drive with all the lights on all the cars turned off.

10. Earth Hour is the largest climate event in the history of the world. It is safe, it will save energy, it will make people aware, and it will help animals of all kinds. To not participate is tantamount to saying you want to hurt people, the earth, and the animals.

March 28, 2009, 8:30 PM local time — TURN THOSE LIGHTS OFF!