Earth Hour began in Sydney, Australia in 2007 and is run by WWF, the World Wildlife Fund.
When is Earth Hour?
The next Earth Hour will take place on Saturday March 28th, 2009 (8:30pm in Toronto).
What You Can Do During Earth Hour
The most important thing is simply to turn off the lights in your home, business, or wherever you are during Earth Hour. How much further you want to go is up to you. You may decide to turn off all the non-essential appliances in your home, or you could just watch the last half of Comedy Now in the dark.• See a photo gallery of what took place in Toronto during Earth Hour 2008
Earth Hour in Nathan Phillips Square
Starting at 7pm, there will be a free concert in Nathan Phillips Square featuring Suzie McNeil, Crash Parallel, The Matt York Band, and Samba Squad. And yes, a concert does sound a little contrary to powering down, but apparently all of the energy needed for the show will be provided from renewable resources by Bullfrog Power.• Get all the details on Earth Hour 2009 in Nathan Phillips Square
What You Can Do After Earth Hour
The real point of Earth Hour is to remind us all what we can be doing in our daily lives to reduce energy consumption. The WWF's Earth Hour website has suggestions, and if you're a homeowner you can look into signing up for Bullfrog Power yourself, the company the City of Toronto uses to power the Earth Hour concerts.• See "The Good Life" section of WWF.ca for ways to make simple changes in your daily life.
• Visit the Bullfrog Power website
Register for Earth Hour
You don't have to register to participate in Earth Hour, but by signing up on the interactive website, you can also get plenty of useful tips emailed to you, let friends know about the event, and be counted for your city and country as supporting positive environmental change.• Register with EarthHour.org
Earth Hour Outside Toronto
Toronto was one of the partner cities in Earth Hour 2008, along with Ottawa, Montreal and Vancouver. Over 40 other cities and towns in Ontario officially registered to participate in Earth Hour, meaning local governments held events or turned off lights in many of their own buildings (without compromising safety, of course).As Canadian cities register for Earth Hour 2009, they'll be listed on the cities page of WWF.ca/EarthHour/.
