Guest essay by Eric Worrall

Social distancing greens worried about whether they should switch off Cable TV or their Internet devices for an hour.

Climate Change: Switch Off Or Save? Protecting The Planet Post Earth Hour

Mike Hughes

This Saturday it is Earth Hour. The World Wildlife Fund’s annual campaign that asks people to ‘switch off’ for an hour to show their support for protecting the planet.

It has never been more timely. With millions of us practicing social distancing and self-isolation our digital activities have increased exponentially. Streaming services such as Netflix have had to take measures to reduce the bandwidth their services use to keep us connected. The call to ‘switch off’ for an hour now applies to more than just lights. 

A recent BBC documentary, Dirty Streaming found that the number one hit single Despacito had over five billion streams online – using as much energy as five African countries in an entire year.

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Read more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/mikehughes1/2020/03/27/climate-change-switch-off-or-save-protecting-the-planet-post-earth-hour/

I normally switch on all the house lights during Earth Hour, to celebrate mankind’s technological achievements, but this Earth Hour I forgot; from memory I spent most of Earth Hour 2020 figuring out what was wrong with my big freezer.