We Wellingtonistas have been strong supporters of Earth Hour in the past, and even though Keith Ng gave it a damned good fisking over on Public Address, we’re still behind the concept. And so, it seems, are a lot of local bars and restaurants, with Wellingtonista favourites Fidels, Sweet Mother’s Kitchen, the Southern Cross, Caffe
Italiano and Trade Kitchen among the many places offering candelit dinners on Saturday night. We just hope it doesn’t make those poor, fragile roller girls crash into one another*.

Keith’s right that the actual energy saved in an hour will be minimal, and the powers (no pun intended) that be are unlikely to be swayed by the symbolism, but that needn’t make it an empty gesture. If it helps a few people understand the impact of their decisions, and look for practical options to save energy in the long term, then it will do some good. Keith points out that switching to low-energy light bulbs is, for most applications, a simple and sensible thing to do right now. So it’s just as well that as part of the Earth Hour promotion, Wellington City Library is giving away free CFL bulbs until Saturday.

[*not really]