The launch ceremony of Earth Hour initiated by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) was held at the Bird's Nest Sports Center in Beijing. The lights of landmark buildings in Chinese cities, including the Bird's Nest in Beijing, the Water Cube and the Coastal City in Shenzhen, were turned off at 20:30.

"Earth Hour" is an initiative put forward by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) to combat global climate change. The activity was launched in 2007, and this year is the 10th year that the activity has entered China. With the importance of energy conservation and environmental protection becoming increasingly prominent today, "Earth Hour" has been welcomed and advocated around the world, but it has also aroused controversy and doubts.

This mainly focuses on two questions: First, is it really energy saving to turn off the lights for an hour? The latest report says that for a single household, turning off the lights for one hour saves a very limited percentage of a year's electricity consumption. As far as society is concerned, Earth Hour reduces electricity consumption by just as little.

Second, many people worry that the "Earth Hour" collective lights off behavior, will cause instantaneous voltage fluctuations that lead to power supply lines paralysis, causing excessive burden on the grid? In fact, compared with the impact on the power grid caused by the factory starting at eight or nine o 'clock every morning and stopping at midnight, the impact of the power grid load brought by "Earth Hour" is very limited, and the power grid has a certain adjustment ability, the impact of "Earth Hour" is basically negligible.

The clarification of the above disputes or doubts indicates that the energy-saving effect of "Earth Hour" is actually very limited, and it will not cause damage to the power grid. However, clarification of these issues can really help us to realize the real significance of this activity.

It should be said that for a long time, many people's cognition of the meaning of "Earth Hour" is simple or even utilitarian. From the beginning, the positioning of "Earth Hour" is to arouse people's thinking about environmental issues such as climate change, advocate a green and environmentally friendly lifestyle, and inspire people's sense of responsibility to protect the earth environment. In other words, turning off the lights for one hour is only a form and a means, and popularizing the concept of environmental protection and inspiring environmental protection actions is the purpose.

In fact, the so-called disputes and doubts are not the denial of the activity itself, but a doubt about how much effect the activity has, which corresponds to a common environmental anxiety of modern people. Obviously, the effect of the activity can not be only counted on that one hour to achieve, but to see what kind of touch and change it can bring.

In fact, such environmental performance art is very much in line with our current "most stringent environmental protection era". Take the theme of this year's activity as an example, it focuses on the issues closely related to public life and can echo the contemporary severe environmental problems, and puts forward 5 areas and 20 specific ways of behavior to advocate the public to actively change, such as shopping with environmentally friendly bags, using less plastic bags, not buying washing chemicals containing polyethylene and other ingredients. And this aspect, is currently our environmental shortboard:

In 2008, The General Office of the State Council issued the "Notice of The General Office of the State Council on restricting the production and sale of plastic shopping bags", to limit and reduce the use of plastic bags, to curb "white pollution". However, the implementation of the "plastic limit order" for 10 years, but little effect, "white pollution" can still be seen everywhere; Statistics show that in 2017, China produced more than 40 billion packages, bringing more than 46 million tons of express waste; In addition, garbage classification has been difficult to implement...

It can be seen that the environmental protection appeal of "Earth Hour" has a very strong realistic pertinence for us. Instead of focusing on the onlookers who turn off the lights for one hour, it is better to seriously think about how to use the high attention of the activity to gather environmental protection consensus, help environmental protection actions, and fully tap the meaning of "Earth Hour" outside the activity.

Source: Guangming Daily

Plastic Industry Video