We see the countless efforts to “Go Green” everywhere: from commercials featuring David Suzuki wielding an impressive-looking caulking gun, on the lookout for the infamous “draft dodger,” to advertisements for biodegradable cutlery and organic food.
Even Vancouver-based athletic clothing store, lululemon, has its own organic line of tank tops and cropped pants.
But the most pronounced effort to reduce our ecological footprint may come from simply flicking off a light switch. This is exactly what the city of Ottawa and Carleton plan to do.
Ottawa will once again be partnering with Hydro Ottawa and the Ottawa Sun to encourage businesses and citizens to participate in the March 28 Earth Hour event.
“In coming together, we can reduce our energy consumption and be a part of the greatest voluntary effort on climate change that the world has ever witnessed,” said mayor Larry O’Brien in a recent Ottawa news release.
Earth Hour began in 2007 in Sydney, Australia, when 2.2 million people turned their lights off for 60 minutes. This year, the goal is to reach one billion people in more than 1,000 cities around the world.
Although there is much publicity surrounding the event, Murdo Murchison, Carleton’s first sustainability officer, said it should be seen only as a starting point for engaging people to take further action.
“We need major policy shifts at the government level to make things happen at the speed they need to happen,” Murchison said in an e-mail.
Murchison has already registered Carleton for its very own Earth Hour event.
Under his leadership, MacOdrum Library will shut off power to four of its five floors for the hour. The Ice House will also power down, along with other athletic facilities not in use.
Created by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Earth Hour is largely symbolic of a global movement towards climate change awareness.
By pulling the plug on electricity, participants hope to send a message to their governments to enact policies that reduce harmful greenhouse gas emissions.
World leaders will meet this December in Copenhagen, Denmark, for the United Nations climate change conference under the Kyoto Protocol.
The conference prepares each leader to retrofit their country to achieve an 80 per cent reduction of 1990-level greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
WWF hopes that the Earth Hour initiative will play a key role in reaching an international agreement for controlling greenhouse gases, said Andrew Dumbrille, a WWF-Canada communications specialist.
He said awareness is growing every year, and not just because of events like Earth Hour.
“People experience climate change in their everyday life, whether it be brush fires in Australia or cardinals coming a month early in Canada,” Dumbrille said. “It pulls on peoples’ heartstrings.”