The low participation rate for Earth Hour across B.C. may be because your citizens are smart enough to understand that the goal of the event is impractical.
Rather than concentrating on worthwhile, achievable objectives such as reducing air, land, and water pollution, Earth Hour wanted the public to “Use your power to change climate change,” to quote this year’s motto, as if we could control the climate like a thermostat.Climate has been changing for billions of years and it will continue to change no matter what we do. Yet Earth Hour spokespeople insisted that all natural climate drivers—ocean currents, cloud cover, solar variations, etc.—are now dwarfed by the impact of humanity’s emissions.
The fact that ‘global temperature’ has remained flat for 18 years while carbon dioxide levels have risen 10 per cent has no impact on their narrative.
But this inconvenient fact does appear to be having an impact on public opinion across Canada. Let’s hope B.C.’s disinterest in Earth Hour is a sign of things to come in the rest of the country and we can get back to working on environmental issues we can actually control.
Tom Harris
International Climate Science Coalition,
Ottawa