When I was at the Green Drinks Event in Saigon some weeks ago, a woman from WWF was talking about Earth Hour. She said (honestly) that it's a big PR campaign to raise awareness. Yes, that's true. My problem with the Earth Hour is, that it is actually nothing more than PR.
Technically it is ridiculous to shut off the lights for one hour. Light's are not consuming that much energy like a television or even computers. And it will have zero effect on climate change. Actually it can be worst because people using candles instead, they produce CO2 by burning wax and pollute the air.
Ok, so what's the message? It's about saving energy to save the planet. I like that. But I would like to see way more commitment to that goal than to switch off the lights for one hour. It's a bit like donating money for Haiti. Yes, it helps for now, but it's not really sustainable (at least this donation has a effect).
My concern is that many people will support the Earth Hour, will press big red buttons, but after they go back to business as usual. I would like to see announcements for Going Green, installing solar panels, support wind energy (Vietnam has ore than 3000 km coastline). Commitments by companies how they want to save energy.
I will be at Barcamp Singapore for the Earth Hour. What about a computer screens, do they count as a light?
1 comment:
Closing roads to traffic for an hour would surely be more beneficial (and more noticeable, certainly in Vietnam) than switching lights off.
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