60 Minutes Plus

For the fifth year, millions across the globe last March 26 have turned off their lights for 60 minutes starting at 8:30 PM to join Earth Hour 2011. Known landmarks such as the Eiffel Tower in Paris, the Sydney Opera House in Australia, the Christ the Redeemer statue at Rio de Janeiro, the Empire State Building in New York went dark to highlight the fight against climate change's adverse effects.

In Bikol, the Albay Provincial Government participated in the Earth Hour through a candle-lighting activity at the Bicol University Oval. Similarly, other LGUs and noted business establishments in the region had shown their support by turning their lights off for more than an hour.

Meanwhile, the catastrophe wrought by the earthquake and tsunami at Japan foregrounds this year’s Earth Hour. The tragedy of that event had become a source of solidarity in which people from various parts of the world expressed and sent support to the devastated nation which remains struggling with another possible disaster in the form of a nuclear reactor meltdown. Earth Hour 2011 began, in fact, with a minute of silence to remember those who perished and are missing still from Japan’s recent calamitous event.

Since the movement began last 2007 at Australia, the World-Wildlife-Fund-initiated Earth Hour has grown to attract worldwide participation for the simplicity of its project: turn off one's lights or electricity for an hour in order to reduce harmful carbon emissions. The success of that simple yet effective effort in saving the planet underscored also the important message of empowerment and global solidarity: together we can help save our dying planet.

Earth Hour, therefore, has more than just raised awareness about the dire effects of human-induced climate change. It has also forged a bond among nations and peoples of various creeds, races, gender, and color to undertake the urgent task of addressing global problems together.

Or in the words of United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, Earth Hour united hundreds of millions of this planet’s inhabitants in 134 nations and territories to “use 60 minutes of darkness to help the world see the light.”