Earth Day 2009

Earth Day was 28th March. Turned off house power for one hour (yeah ... power to the entire house!! extreme huh?!) and then took a walk over to 1Utama to pass the time. Saw a few houses participating in the event, my immediate surrounding neighbours were in it. It was obvious who was taking part as their lights were out but their televisions were not - every living room had that eerie glow :D

1Utama turned down their exterior lights but advertising spotlights were still blazing away (with the most obvious being the current large McDonalds near the old wing). Inside 1U, only a few tenants were actively participating. TGIF was seen promoting candlelight dining and surprisingly was still bringing in the dinner crowd. Others that I noticed included McDonalds (which partly turned off their dining area lights), Carls' Jr and Daves bistro (near the deli). Jusco supermarket started off late but in the end turned down maybe around three quarters of their lights leaving on the payment area and every alternate aisle lit. Other tenants seemed oblivious to the event especially places like Guardian which was unsurprisingly 'bright' since their opposite tenant (McDs) were switched off.

According to today's newspaper report, that solitary hour of action resulted in a dip of 550MW (thats megawatts) of electricity which could have powered up 14 million 40W flourescent bulbs for the same period! With the formula 1kWH = 1.55lbs CO₂ that means we've reduced carbon emissions for that hour by a staggering 550,000×1.55 = 852,500lbs!! Not too bad ...

So did YOU turn off the lights?