Friday’s Headlines

17 comments

1. The “National Post” is a joke.

   It still baffles me, as i continue to debate with an american on Youtube, how many people still believe global warming is either non-existent or we shouldn’t be worrying about it. As if saying we’re all a bunch of enviro-hippies.

   First, i’m not one, and two, there’s PLENTY of evidence global warming exists and we should be doing something about it.

   What is it with conservatives and their lack of “faith” for a better environmental future?! Do they not also want to partake in a clean and sustainable future?? Seems like all they’re into is dollars.

2. .. to add, who CARES is Coke is a major sponsor to Earth Hour! Scotia Bank is a major sponsor to Nuit Blanche, but that doesn’t make it any worse! I’m not going to go out and get wasted on Coca Cola or open up a Scotia account anytime soon.

   Simply ridiculous editorial column in THe Post.(*argh!)

   *If i could comment on their site i would, but lucky for them, they don’t have anywhere for blog commentors. Smart move on their part.

3. The difficulty many people have with Earth Hour is that participating is “casting your vote for action on climate change”, without any definition of what that action might be.

   Action merely for action’s sake is rarely effective, and can sometimes be quite counterproductive.

   You say you want a revolution? We’d all love to see the plan.

4. You want a definition of an action that Earth Hour may ignite?

   Uh.. how about “saving power”? An 8 yr. old could have figured that out.

   *Good to see you on both Spacing and Blogto btw..

5. The momentary power savings are not mentioned anywhere on the Earth Hour website that I can see.

   But yes, if it’s a repeat of last year, Toronto electricity consumption will drop by almost 9% for one hour.

   http://www.toronto.ca/teo/earth-hour.htm

   But how much more electricity might we save that night without the floodlit, electrically-amplified two-and-a-half-hour-long “Earth Hour Celebration Concert” in Nathan Philips Square?

6. Any info on the new City of Toronto garbage bins appearing around town? http://wvs.topleftpixel.com/09/03/27/

7. I agree with the sentiment of the NP article, and I can’t see where they said global warming does not exist.

   I don’t see it as being a political issue as you do (as I generally lean left) but rather the NP is simply identifying the hypocrisies that exist in the concept of Earth Hour. For me the ultimate was an article about Earth Hour events in the Star a few weeks ago that illustrated an Earth Hour “party” around a giant bonfire.

8. I appologize Joel, what i meant was “this guy on Youtube” thought global warming didnt’ exist. I wrongfully carried that into my NP statement. Sorry for the confusion.

   Of course hypocricies exist all around us. But the media jumps on everything that’s negative and runs with it. All i was saying is that “in general” Earth Hour is a worthy cause. But the media(*and some commentors) thrive on the negative.

   It’s one thing to name an article, “Coke sponsors Earth Hour? That’s a little ironic” and quite another, “Earth Hour is a joke!”.

   What emotional response would you have to both?(*and my not being a hippie btw)

9. At the risk of coming across as a curmudgeon, what irks me about exercises such as “Earth Hour” is that it gives us (as individuals and as members of various institutions) WAAAY too much latitude to believe that we are actually doing something good without actually changing our behaviour in any substantial way. Regarding the Star’s profile of Earth Day participants, the biggest joke (for me) was coverage of how the lights will out in Dundas Square for an hour — without of course mentionning all the energy that’s squandered on all those hyper-aggressive, flashing billboards during all the other hours of the year.

   Certainly, I think the concerns motivating “Earth Hour” are valid. But it also seems designed to allow way too many of us who are part of the problem to think we are actually “working” to make things better.

10. I agree wholeheartedly with the sentiment behind Earth Hour. It’s the execution that I find to be counterproductive.

    (But I’m tough to please. For the record, I also have misgivings about the Global Warming movement. When the cycle inevitably swings back to cooling (as some claim is already happening), people will say “mission accomplished!” and will happily go about abusing the environment again.)

11. Earth hour is a gimmick. Pretending to care for one hour a year is cute, but if you really cared, wouldn’t every hour be earth hour?

12. Luke: Earth hour is a gimmick. Pretending to care for one hour a year is cute, but if you really cared, wouldn’t every hour be earth hour?

    Pardon my french Luke and no disrespect, but “D’UH!”

    Cutesy gimmick or not, there’s no harm in still reminding people to not polute! It’s not rocket science.

13. Earth hour is a dumb idea. How about pressuring manufactures to reduce the vampire power that many products suck 24 hours a day. There are some microwaves that use more power total for their digital clock than the actual amount of time people actually microwave.

14. I remember hearing years and years ago that in fact, turning lights on again uses several hours’ worth of electricity. Does anyone know if that’s just a myth? And if not, I can only assume that turning them on requires some substantial amount of electricity. I wonder if there’s a difference for incandescent vs. fluorescent lights?

    In any case, of course power consumption goes down during earth hour, but does the average for the day go down? A guy in Australia says it doesn’t (or at least, that there are insufficient data to say for sure, but it looks like it probably goes up): http://catchwa.org/2008/03/was-earth-hour-a-joke-again/

    Token, meaningless acts to raise awareness seem intuitively to be effective. I’m just not convinced that lack of awareness is the problem any more in the case of global warming. We need to start electing governments with an environmental agenda, governments who’ll raise the cost of energy and impose strict legislation to protect the environment. Even if Earth Hour were effective in some way (and I’m skeptical), we can’t depend on awareness and the goodwill of citizens and corporations to stop or slow climate change.

15. I read that at Pearson, they turned off lights that normally ran all the time, found that nobody noticed their absence and left them off. That’s a good use of Earth Hour. Simply turning off the lights in your house won’t get what’s needed – conservation – done.

    I turned off no lights this year for Earth Hour, but I’m properly insulating my house’s basement and replacing the 25 year old furnace – I think I can afford to skip it.

16. skube: Torontoist and Spacing wrote about the prototypes on display at City Hall last June. This week, Torontoist took a look at how they’re faring in the wild.

17. Jessica,
    Turning lights on (house lights at least) does require a lot of energy — BUT only apparently equivalent to about 7 minutes worth of keeping the light on. So if you are planning on turning a light off for less than 7 minutes, you’ll save energy by keeping it on. Anything more than about 7 minutes, you will save energy by turning it off.