Switch off for Earth Hour

8.30pm on Saturday 27th March sees the start of Earth Hour, when we are all urged to switch off unnecessary lights for an hour in support of resource conservation. Iconic buildings like the Empire State Building, Sydney Opera House and the Las Vegas Strip will go dark for an hour at 8.30pm local time. Seems like the perfect opportunity for a candlelit dinner.

Or why not go one further and switch off the TV, PC and gaming consoles too and play good old-fashioned board games or cards?

The WWF is encouraging participants to record their contribution by uploading photos to Flickr, videos to YouTube and tweeting with the hashtag #earthhour. You can find details of how to get involved here.

Climate Savers Computing is encouraging all its members to set their computer's power management settings to a more frugal setting for Earth Hour - a timely reminder that if you work in an office it's likely to be unoccupied for at least 70% of the time. Turning off computers and other office machines out of hours could reduce your energy bill as well as your carbon footprint, so reach for that off switch before you go home this weekend.

Earth Hour retrospective

So, all over the World, lights were dimmed to demonstrate to our various governments that we want them to act, urgently and decisively, on climate change. It's pretty humbling when you consider it as an act of global consciousness. This video really brings that home.

Earth Hour - spread the word!

Just under two years ago in Sydney, Australia, a global movement was born. By switching off its lights for one hour to draw attention to the issue of climate crisis, Sydney created Earth Hour. Now adopted by the WWF, Earth Hour had grown by 2008 to include 370 cities and an estimated 50 million people Worldwide; in Australia, it is claimed that 58% of adults took part. Now support is being gathered for Earth Hour 2009, which in the UK will take place from 8.30 to 9.30 pm on Saturday 28th March.

Last year my household took part, having stumbled across it thanks to Google's black screen. It was easy, it was fun, and we're planning to do it again. The WWF wants to encourage as many individuals and businesses as possible to join in and already over 680 cities from 75 countries have signed up, including my home town of Reading.

There's loads of good stuff on WWF's website, including an inspiring video and a toolkit. All you have to do is switch off your lights for an hour - but businesses that close for the weekend can make an even bigger statement by switching off from Friday to Monday. A quick look at the photos here will demonstrate just how beneficial that could be.