Earth Hour 2011: Cities Around The World Go Dark Saturday (PHOTOS)

Celebrating its 5th birthday, Earth Hour is back again. Join people in thousands of cities worldwide when lights are shut off for an entire hour at 8:30 p.m. local time on Saturday, March 26, 2011.

Earth Hour, organized by WWF, started in 2007 in Australia, with 2.2 million people and 2,000 businesses shutting off their lights for an hour in a stand against climate change. Just one year later, Earth Hour had become a global event with 50 million people participating across the globe, according to Earth Hour's website. 2010 was the biggest Earth Hour yet, with a record 128 countries and territories participating. Now lend your support to make 2011 even bigger!

Check out Earth Hour on Meetup.com to see events happening in your area. And remember, you don't have to be a part of a big group to join the action -- it's as simple as turning off your lights for one hour!

In the meantime, check out some amazing photos below of iconic landmarks around the world shutting down their lights for last year's Earth Hour.

Comments

[fireofenergy]

01:01 AM on 04/03/2011

Gov interventi­on should be in creating some kind of TRADE tariff...
To fund a robotic LiFePO4 (or better) battery factory to make it like 5 times cheaper. I "KNOW" it is possible in today's automated world if made by a company that "did it all under one roof". We also should concentrat­­e on having a company as large as the oil companies to do solar, again "all under one roof"...

Seriously, we need to get rid of the profiteeri­­ng at all the little steps in the solar and renewable energy industries­!
That way, oil will still be cheap enough to keep the big rigs and jets going until there is a way to electrify them too.

[abbienormal]

09:28 PM on 04/02/2011

Wow, this is a tr0llfest. Moving on...

[wanderee]

01:05 PM on 03/28/2011

It has become a useless celebration. If there are useless lights it's better to remove them instead of switching them off for just 1 hour.

[seawillow]

09:50 AM on 03/28/2011

Conservation, reducing pollution, finding smart energy sources, all great things, everyone should agree. To believe we can "fix" the ever-changing climate of the earth is another matter.

[ken607]

09:09 AM on 03/28/2011

light is pollution too. most cities can do this every night! but their no money in it for them huh?

[jumpingjackflash]

12:09 AM on 03/28/2011

Earth hour has got to be one of the dumbest things ever. The generation and transmission of electricity is the greatest invention of mankind. We should be celebrating it, not demonizing it.

[Chris 1]

05:11 PM on 03/30/2011

Yes, but in the land of green regression and religion dressed as "science" the emotions are quite different.

[Broderick Crawford]

10:43 PM on 03/27/2011

I hear that even Las Vegas turned off their Welcome sign for an hour. The $10.00 in savings for shutting down the sign should have an immediate impact on their pesky unemployment problems.

[DeathByModeration]

08:11 PM on 03/27/2011

I turned off all my lights and went out for a drive in my 10mpg truck to look at all the shopping centers and fast food joints lit up better than Christmas.

[goingstrong]

09:51 PM on 03/27/2011

did you take your sister, i mean wife with you too?

[DeathByModeration]

10:22 AM on 03/28/2011

No, man, I had your sister and your wife.

:D

[Spiral Architect]

06:07 PM on 03/27/2011

Silly symbolic gestures appealing to those of limited knowledge and shallow intellect (notice how the organization behind it does its best to indoctrinate children at school, as they don't yet grasp the encompassing politics behind energy use, conservation, and environmental science, and are sure to come home to Mom & Dad making a big stink about "Earth Hour") ALWAYS fade in meaning, significance, and popularity. "Earth Hour" was always hollow.

[ken607]

09:16 AM on 03/28/2011

like ive always said "theres nothing conservative about a conservative!"

[fireofenergy]

01:13 AM on 04/03/2011

Silly such gestures are needed to raise awareness ESPECIALLY for kids. Who ??? thinks there are no reasons to fear global warming and thinks there is no need to make solar and batteries five times less expensive which is easily attainable (through robotics) and thus affordable in a world not dominated by shallow intellect...

[krz2]

02:51 PM on 03/27/2011

what a perfect metaphor . Why stop with one hour. How about a week, a month, a year would represent such a success! And these are the smart people, the people that care.

[mrsjones01]

11:49 AM on 03/27/2011

My husband and I took part in earth hour. We lit the million candles in our home that are often neglected. It was a so nice that never turned the lights, TV, or radio back on. It turned out to be a really nice evening that we plan to repeat.

[DaveShoe]

11:13 AM on 03/27/2011

It might be a little ironic if Earth Hour created a sufficiently sudden power reduction to generate a power surge at a nuclear power plant, forcing an automated reactor shutdown at which time a faulty backup cooling system was energized.

Maybe applying social pressure to return to the "drive 55" days would be a safer and more meaningful reminder. I don't remember the "drive 55" law ever being popular (maybe it was in some circles), but if it ever became popular it would be an ongoing reminder that energy consumption is not without cost, and you wouldn't feel obligated to turn all your lights on at 9:30 just to make it obvious you turned them off at 8:30.

I feel for the power plant operators on this one.

[Anne Mccormick]

01:27 AM on 03/27/2011

you know, i was so tired that i decided to take a nap at 5:30 so i turned off the lights, put the messaging on my phone and went to sleep. i slept through Earth hour. when i woke up at 10:00pm it was over.

[rbarry647]

11:13 PM on 03/26/2011

I had an unexpected discovery from this Earth Hour, with my lights out I walked into the kitchen and noticed I could see the light from inside me refrigerator on. Totally unexpected since the frig is only 2 years old. I can't imagine how much energy / money I am losing because my frig seal is not working.

[Hazmi Anas]

10:26 PM on 03/26/2011

Yea!everyone support earth hour...

[jumpingjackflash]

12:40 AM on 03/28/2011

Why?