Earth Hour

Earth Hour is an international event organised by the WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature/World Wildlife Fund).and held on the last Saturday of March each year, which asks households and businesses to turn off their non-essential lights and electrical appliances for one hour to raise awareness towards the need to take action on climate change.Earth hour was conceived by WWF Australia and the Sydney Morning Herald in 2007, when 2.2 million residents of Sydney participated by turning off all non-essential lights. Following Sydney's lead, many other cities around the world adopted the event in 2008.Earth Hour will next take place on Saturday, March 28, 2009 at 8:30 pm, local time. Earth Hour 2009: Earth Hour 2009 is from 8:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. local time,2009-03-28. Currently, 82 countries and more than 2100 cities are 'committed to Earth Hour 2009', a huge increase from people participating in 35 countries for Earth Hour 2008.1 billion 'votes' is the stated aim for Earth Hour 2009, in the context of the pivotal 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference.Among the participants this year is, for the first time, the United Nations building. The U.N. conservatively estimates that its participation will save $102 in energy. Earth Hour 2008: With 35 countries around the world participating as official flagship cities and over 400 cities also supporting, Earth Hour 2008 was celebrated on all seven continents. Iconic landmarks all around the world turned off their non-essential lighting for Earth Hour which included the Empire State Building (New York City), Sears Tower (Chicago), Golden Gate Bridge (San Francisco), Bank of America Plaza (Atlanta), Sydney Opera House (Sydney, Australia), Wat Arun Buddhist Temple (Bangkok, Thailand), the Colosseum (Rome, Italy), Royal Castle (Stockholm, Sweden), London's City Hall (England), Space Needle (Seattle, USA), the CN Tower (Toronto, Canada) and SM Mall of Asia & SM Science Discovery Center (Manila, Philippines).The official website for the event, earthhour.org, received over 6.7 million unique visitors in the week leading up to Earth Hour. Other websites took part in the event, with Google's homepage going "dark" on the day Earth Hour took place.According to a Zogby International online survey 36 million people participated in Earth Hour 2008. The survey also showed there was a 4 percentage point increase in awareness of environmental issues such as climate change, directly after the event.2007 Participants:Sydney, Australia. About 2.2 million households and businesses participated in the first ever Earth Hour. Scheduling:Sydney Harbour Bridge and Opera House were darkened during Earth Hour 2007.Before 2008, San Francisco had been running a "Lights Out" program of their own that occurred in October. For 2008, it was being moved to March 29 to align with Australia's Earth Hour. This also happened to be the year that Earth Hour became an international event and San Francisco was asked to be a partner city in Earth Hour. Rather than have a competing event, San Francisco has supported Earth Hour and all Lights Out efforts have now moved to supporting the international Earth Hour event. Since Earth Hour for 2008 was on a Saturday, many high schools in the Greater Toronto Area participated by turning off half the lights in classrooms during the last hour of school on Friday, March 28, 2008. Although the tagline of Earth Hour 2008 was officially, "See the difference you can make," the official radio advertisement ended with the tagline, "Dark city, bright idea."Many buildings in Sydney also turned off their lights in 2007.Tel Aviv scheduled their Earth Hour for Thursday March 27, 2008 to avoid conflict with Sabbath. Dublin moved their Earth Hour to between 9 and 10 p.m. due to their northern geographical location.Energy saved:Colosseum darkened for Earth Hour 2008.According to WWF Thailand, Bangkok decreased electricity usage by 73.34 megawatts, which, over one hour, is equivalent to 41.6 tonnes of carbon dioxide. The Bangkok Post gave different figures of 165 megawatts-hours and 102 tonnes of carbon dioxide. This was noted to be significantly less than a similar campaign initiated by Bangkok's City Hall the previous year in May where 530 megawatt-hours were saved and 143 tonnes of carnon dioxide emission was cut.Toronto saved 900 megawatt-hours of electricity. 8.7% was saved if measured against a typical March Saturday night.Ireland, as a whole, had a reduction in electricity use of about 1.5% for the evening. In the three-hour period between 18:30 and 21:30, there was a reduction of 50 megawatts, saving 150 megawatt-hours, or approximately 6 tonnes of carbon dioxide.Golden Gate Bridge and Marin Headlands public open space in the background, before (inset) and during Earth Hour 2008.In Dubai, where external lighting on several major city landmarks was turned off and street lighting in selected areas was dimmed by 50%, the Electricity and Water Authority reported savings of 100 megawatt-hours of electricity. This represented a 2.4% reduction in demand compared to before the hour began.The Sky Tower in Auckland, New Zealand, switched off its usual floodlighting during the Earth Hour, and re-lit afterwards.The best result was from Christchurch, New Zealand. The city reported a drop of 13% in electricity demand. However, Transpower reported that New Zealand's power consumption during Earth Hour was 335 megawatts, higher than the 328 megawatt average of the previous two Saturdays. Melbourne, Australia saved 10.1% of electricity. Sydney, being the city that participated both 2007 and 2008 Earth Hour, cut 8.4% electricity consumption. This is less than last year's 10.2%, however Earth Hour executive director Andy Ridley made the claim that after factoring margin of error, the participation in this city is the same as last year.The worst result was from Calgary, Canada. The city's power consumption actually went up 3.6% at the hour's peak electricity demand. In Calgary, however, where weather plays a large role in power consumption, the city experienced weather 12°C colder than the previous Saturday's recorded temperature.

EXAMS!!!!!!

I passed all my exams....I got a A* for Maths...I got a A for my Mother Tongue and got a B for my English:) I just have not gotten my Science marks yet...Hope i did well.....:)

Hey

hi people... i just changed my blogskin

HEY

I don't know much about the kampong houses thing.. so everything might be nonsense

Traditional VS. Modern Houses

1.Malay houses are a highly evolved form of traditional dwelling,originating before the arrival of foreign or modern influences,constructed by the indigenous Malay and Orang Asli peoples of the Malay Peninsula and their related Bumiputra tribes of Sabah and Sarawak.Whereas peninsular Malays have single-extended family houses,many of the Borneo people built long houses hosting many families,each in its own kampong houses with a common wide veranda linking the front..... Sorry miss zheng, i don't really know much about kampong houses so it copied this from wikipedia.... question number 2 too.
2.Traditional architectural forms, such as tropically-suited roofs and harmonious proportions with decorative elements are considered by traditionalists to still have relevance.However traditional buildings require significant maintenance compared to modern construction.These traditional skills are gradually being lost as Malaysia continues to the process of industrialisation..... miss zheng the words are big and i got nothing to do with it... it came from the wikipedia website....:)

Total Defence Day

I would try to defend the country from starting riots. I will not use other languages to scold my frenz.......:)

Reflection 1...your dream

My dream is to become a ntional basketball player.... i will not only train on my basketball but, i will also study......:)