Earth Hour

I just tonight received an email from my town reminding me of Earth Hour on March 28, 2009 from 8:30 to 9:30 PM –

Earth Hour began in Sydney, Australia in 2007 when 2.2 million homes and businesses switched off their lights for one hour. In 2008, the message had grown into a global sustainability movement with over 50 million people switching off their lights. This is an opportunity for people everywhere to show their support for greater environmental responsibility. The simple act of turning off our lights will demonstrate our commitment to personal responsibility to reverse the effects of global warming. This year, people and organizations in over 74 countries and territories have pledged their support for Earth Hour 2009. Organizers of this event hope to obtain the support of over one billion people across the planet. Results of this effort will be presented to world leaders at the Global Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark in 2009. Won’t you join us? For more information, please go to http://www.earthhour.org.

I wrote about this event last year and, just like last year, I haven’t seen much publicity about it. So, I though it was a good time to mention it and update you on my electricity usage and attempt at better environmental responsibility. In that last post I mentioned the effort I had undertaken to identify the electricity hogs in my household.

First and foremost saving electricity means saving money. But, in June of last year it was really time to ‘put my money where my mouth is’. We signed up for a clean energy option from our electric supplier. This means that 100% of the electricity we use is generated through renewable sources. In our locale that means small hydro and wind. Well, it’s not exactly the electricity we use but an equivalent amount of clean energy is introduced into the regional grid.

This change means we spend an extra $8-$10 per month. But, I am happy to report that in 8 of the 9 months since that change we have used less electricity when compared to the like period in any of the five years that I have been keeping usage records.

So, join Earth Hour. Then go out and push your 5.0L V8 Mustang to the limit…guilt free, of course.
If you were brave enough to click through the ‘more’ link, you really must be into this. Me too, and here’s just how serious I take this stuff (and what a geek I am). Here’s how I track usage (numbers are average daily kWh; green means lowest in row; red means highest)