The Earth Hour is an annual event organised by the World Wide Fund for Nature every last Saturday of March. The event is held to create awareness about climate change all across the globe. Households and business organisations all over the world turn off their unessential lights and appliances for one hour.
- The Earth Hour in 2013 was held on March 23 from 8.30 pm to 9.30 pm.
- The Earth Hour in 2014 is scheduled on March 29, 2014 at the same time across time zones.
The concept was first conceived by the WWF and Leo Burnett, an advertising agency, and first implemented in Sydney in 2007. Gradually, other countries followed the example and today the Earth Hour is observed worldwide.
In 2004, alarmed by the findings on climate change, WWF in collaboration with Leo Burnett worked on the idea of large scale shutting down of electrical appliances and devices to create awareness on climate change in Australia.
The event was originally named as the ‘Big Flick’ and it got the backing of the then Mayor Clover Moore in 2007.
The first Earth Hour was held on March 31, 2007 at 7.30 pm in Sydney.
Following the example, San Francisco ran its own version of the campaign and called it ‘Lights Out’.
In 2008, the Earth Hour was observed internationally on March 29. As many as 35 countries and 400 cities participated in the event in 2008.
The Earth Hour 2008 was observed in all seven continents.
Some of the renowned landmarks of the world expressed their consolidation by switching off lights for one hour on Earth Day. Some of these monuments are the Sydney Opera House, the Empire State Building, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Petronas Towers etc.
The shutting down of lights and electrical appliances globally helped in reducing energy consumption. While Bangkok reported a reduced usage of 73.34 megawatts, Philippine Electricity Market Corp reported a drop of 78.63 MW.
Google also gave free publicity to the Earth Hour event in 2008. The Google homepage blacked out in the US, Colombia, Ireland, Denmark and UK from 12.00 am till the end of the Earth Hour in order to remind people of the event.
As many as 96 countries participated in the Earth Hour in 2009.
The Earth Hour in the subsequent year i.e. in 2010 is reportedly the biggest Earth Hour so far. It has participation from 126 countries.
The event grew bigger and received more participation over the years.
Through the Earth Hour, people all across the globe get a chance to unite for a greater cause and contribute to reducing climate change and effects of global warming by switching off lights for an hour.
Reduced use of electricity can create a major difference in reducing the effects of global warming. Electricity usage can be reduced by shutting off lights that are not in use, switching off televisions, computer screens and other appliances after use.
