The lights are going down from the Great Pyramids to the Acropolis, the Eiffel Tower to the Sears Tower, as more than 2,800 municipalities in 84 countries plan today to mark the second worldwide Earth Hour.
McDonald’s will even soften the yellow glow from some Golden Arches as part of the time zone-by-time zone plan to dim nonessential lights between 8:30pm and 9:30pm to highlight global climate change.
“Earth Hour makes a powerful statement that the world is going to solve this problem,” said Carter Roberts, chief executive of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), which sponsors Earth Hour. “Everyone is realizing the enormous effect that climate change will have on them.”
Seven times more municipalities have signed on since last year’s Earth Hour, which drew participation from 400 cities after Sydney, Australia, held a solo event in 2007. Interest has spiked ahead of planned negotiations on a new global warming treaty in Copenhagen, Denmark, this December. The last global accord, the Kyoto Protocol, is set to expire in 2012.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon encouraged the convention to reach a fair and effective climate change agreement and promoted Earth Hour participation in a video posted this month on the event’s YouTube channel.
“Earth Hour is a way for the citizens of the world to send a clear message,” Ban said. “They want action on climate change.”
New studies increasingly highlight the ongoing effects of climate change, said Richard Moss, a member of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and WWF’s climate change vice president.
“We have satellites and we have ships out at sea and we have monitoring stations set up on buoys in the ocean,” Moss said. “We monitor all kinds of things people wouldn’t even think about. The scientific research is showing in all kinds of ways that the climate crisis is worsening.”
This year’s Earth Hour has garnered support from global corporations, nonprofit groups, schools, scientists and celebrities — including Oscar-winning actress Cate Blanchett and Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
Nearly 200 US cities, towns and villages have signed on, from New York City — which will darken the iconic Empire State Building and Broadway marquees — to Igiugig, population 53 on Iliamna Lake in southwestern Alaska.
Among the efforts in Chicago, 50,000 light bulbs at tourist hotspot Navy Pier will dim and 24 spotlights that shine on the Sears Tower’s twin spires will go dark.
The Commonwealth Edison utility said electricity demand fell by 5 percent in Chicago and northern Illinois during last year’s Earth Hour, reducing carbon dioxide emissions by about 380 tonnes.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not