Take Action (events)

In about three months time nighttime Sydney is expected to become sea of darkness. For an hour of no power. Also known by its organisers as Earth Hour. The aim is to get office blocks and householders to turn off their lights for a mere 60 minutes between 7.30 and 8.30 pm on 31 March 2007, with the intent of moving folk to reducing their greenhouse gas emissions by five percent. If they can manage this, it would be the equal of removing 75,000 medium-sized cars from the road. The commercial sector is being targeted because the campaign organisers, which include WWF, believe CO2 emissions attributable to lighting could be reduced by 80% just by turning off office lights and installing energy efficient lights. One calculation suggests that if all city office blocks installed motion sensor lighting the power saved could supply 13,000 homes for a year. City of Sydney’s Lord Mayor, Clover Moore, is of the view that, "Australia's commercial business sector is responsible for around 10 per cent of national greenhouse gas emissions,” so she wants businesses to get behind the campaign, while 22 year old Sarah Bishop, (pictured) will walk the thousand kilometres (1,200 miles) from Brisbane to Sydney to raise the same issues in smaller communities, in the two months preceding . ::Earth Hour, via the Sydney Morning Herald.