Toronto drops 115 MW at Earth Hour

- Toronto Hydro reports that the city collectively dropped about 115 MW of electricity use during Earth Hour, March 26.

By cutting back on their electricity usage, Torontonians were able to remove approximately 12 skyscrapers or 35,000 homes from the city's grid.

For those interested in finding out how much electricity an individual household saved during the hour, Toronto Hydro customers who are signed up for the Time-of-Use rates portal can log into their account and view how much electricity they saved during Earth Hour.

NB Power was pleased with that provinceÂ’s participation in Earth Hour, calling it the most successful one yet in New Brunswick.

Earth Hour, a global environmental event to get people thinking about climate change, saw people turning off the lights for an hour on Saturday night.

In New Brunswick, energy consumption was reduced by 24 megawatts for the hour, which the company said is equal to turning off 480,000 lights.

"We are pleased to see so many New Brunswickers participated in this challenge," said Sherry Thomson, vice-president of customer service, distribution and transmission at NB Power. "This is truly a testament to how we can all work together... to help protect the environment for future generations."

Earth Hour began in 2007 in Sydney, Australia, and by 2010 had grown to involve 128 countries.

"Earth Hour is a wonderful educational and awareness opportunity and it is our hope that as a result, New Brunswickers will be more conscious of what they can do to conserve energy," Thomson said.