Earth Hour

«Earth Hour» began as a symbolic gesture in one city – Sydney, Australia, in 2007.

First time round, two million people turned off their lights and appliances. The initial expectation was to reduce energy consumption in the Australian capital by five per cent during the 60-minute “event”. The result, however, was twice as much as hoped for: a 10.2 per cent reduction.

In 2008, more than 50 million people worldwide joined the simple ecological campaign – the principal objective of which is to call attention to climate change, the effects of which we’ve seen up-close over the last few weeks.

The cataclysmic destruction in Madeira, as well as the mini-tornados that have wreaked chaos in previously unaffected areas like Praia do Vau, near Portimão (in a country where, let’s face it, tornadoes are usually unheard of…) show the man in the street that things are definitely not right.

This year, the towns of Lisbon and Faro are planning to join the «Planet Hour» initiative, promoted by World Wildlife Fund (WWF). In 2009, the event was supported by 11 Portuguese cities - out of a total of 4.000 worldwide - and spanned 88 countries.

All things considered, there’s good reason to switch off our technology for a few moments. The most recent United Nations study on E-waste considers that “electronic fall-out, resulting from cellphones, computers, printers and other appliances, will increase “dramatically” over the next decade.

And waste caused by the dumping of electronic devices throughout the world continues to grow at the rate of 40 million tons per year.

Rubbish produced by cellphones thrown out in India, for example, is expected to increase 18–fold from 2007 to 2020 – while that of China will go up seven times the current figure, the report says.

Meantime, the US is currently the world’s greatest producer of E-waste and electronic junk – producing three million tons of it per year.

The problem is that this waste is incorrectly “made use of” by third world scrap merchants in search of valuable components, like the copper or gold present in electric wiring. And toxins emitted into the atmosphere when this electronic detritus is burnt harm the environment and health of everyone on the planet.

So, come on, let’s switch everything off?!