Filipinos turn off lights for environment – INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos.

By Nestor P. Burgos Jr., Jhunnex Napallacan, Mar S. Arguelles
Inquirer Visayas, Inquirer Southern Luzon
First Posted 01:46:00 03/28/2011 inquirer.net

MANILA, Philippines—Power demand in Metro Cebu dropped on Saturday night as homes and businesses switched off nonessential lights to observe Earth Hour, dubbed the world’s largest voluntary action for the environment.

Visayas Electric Co. (Veco) has around 300,000 customers in Metro Cebu, including big malls like SM City Cebu and Ayala Center Cebu that participated in the event.

When the lights were turned off at SM Cebu, Fr. Tito Soquiño led the prayer for tsunami and earthquake victims in Japan.

Ethel Natera, Veco corporate communications manager in the Visayas, said the power load went down to 248.8 megawatts (MW) at 9:30 p.m. from 266.0 MW at 8:30 p.m.

The 18-MW drop in Veco’s power load in the metropolis was bigger than the 14-MW decline registered in the 2010 Earth Hour, according to Natera.

Candlelit run

In Legazpi City, more than 1,500 people ran a three-kilometer stretch of Rizal Street after lights in most of the houses and establishments had been turned off.

After the run, which began on the oval of Bicol University and ended on Quezon Avenue, the group and their lighted candles formed the word “Mayon,” the province’s emblem.

Manuel Rangaza, executive director of the Center for Initiative and Research on Climate Adaptation (CIRCA), said Albay’s Earth Hour participation was a success.

He said hundreds of households switched off their lights and that environment advocates from the youth, business, government and civil society took part in the run despite the rain.

Global advocacy

Earth Hour is a global advocacy to raise awareness of climate change and the need to protect the environment by limiting power consumption and carbon emission.

A total of 134 countries took part in the event, Earth Hour cofounder and executive director Andy Ridley said in Sydney, where the movement began in 2007.

“The amount of power that’s saved during that time is not really what it’s about,” Ridley said. “What it is meant to be about is showing what can happen when people come together.”

Organizers also asked people to commit themselves to an action, large or small, that they would carry through the year to help the planet.

Eiffel Tower

In Paris, a minute’s silence was observed for Japan as the city went dark, with illuminations switched off at the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame cathedral, City Hall, opera houses and many bridges, fountains and public places.

Sydney’s Opera House was the first of many global landmarks to go dark as the event got under way, as hundreds of millions of people prepared to follow suit to enhance awareness of energy use and climate change.

Others in their turn included Beijing’s “Bird’s Nest” stadium that hosted the 2008 Olympics, the London Eye ferris wheel, Times Square in New York and Brazil’s Christ the Redeemer statue.

In Japan, which is reeling from a huge earthquake and tsunami that struck this month, several thousand people and a hotel-turned-evacuation center in the northeast marked Earth Hour.

In Russia, some 30 cities joined in, from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the most easterly city on the Kamchatka peninsula, through Moscow to Murmansk in the far north.

Acropolis

In Athens, monuments being darkened included the Acropolis, the parliament building, the presidential palace and the temple of Poseidon near the city.

In Italy, more than 200 towns and cities took part. The Ponte Vecchio in Florence, the Tower of Pisa and the Colosseum in Rome all turned off their lights for an hour.

In the United States, parts of Boston’s and Chicago’s skyline turned dark as many buildings joined the event.

In South Africa, the Grammy award winning group Soweto Gospel choir along with other local musicians treated hundreds of people to a free candlelight concert in the township of Soweto.

World Wildlife Fund (WWF)-Philippines said it expected 18 million Filipinos to participate in the event. About 1,500 municipalities and cities had agreed to join the switch off in the country, said WWF Earth Hour project director Gia Ibay.

Ibay said at least 40 malls had committed to turn off their nonessential lights during the hour-long event that dimmed parts of Metro Manila.

DoE’s role

The less active role of government agencies, including the Department of Energy (DoE), hindered a wider and bigger observance of Earth Hour, said one of the event organizers in Iloilo City.

Ted Aldwin Ong, president of the Freedom from Debt Coalition-Iloilo, said the information campaign by government agencies urging residents to join the activity was less visible than its role in the past few years.

Antonio Labios, DoE-Visayas field office director, said the department “fully” supported the activity but acknowledged that it had “limited” participation this year because of government’s austerity measures.

The ceremonial countdown in Iloilo City held at SM City mall was initiated by FDC-Iloilo and the University of the Philippines in the Visayas College of Management, and was joined by officials led by Mayor Jed Patrick Mabilog, students from different schools and artists.

Earth Hour in 2009 resulted in a 40-MW drop in power consumption in the Visayas grid. Last year, consumption declined by 52 MW.

WWF has yet to compute the amount of electricity saved during the one-hour break this year. In the 2009 switch-off, the Philippines saved a total of 611 MW, equivalent to a temporary shutdown of a dozen coal-fired power plants.

The environmental group Kalikasan People’s Network for the Environment said the switching off of lights was not enough, claiming that the coal-fired power plants continue to harm the environment.

“In addition to switching off our lights, a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants is needed to save our climate and protect our environment,” Kalikasan-PNE national coordinator Clemente Bautista said in a statement.

Coal-fired power plants have been identified as among the largest emitters of carbon dioxide, Bautista said. With reports from Kristine L. Alave and Agence France-Presse

 

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