The "Lights Out HK" campaign is featured in Lamma-Gung's <a href="http://www.compunicate.com/Lamma-zine/includes_news.html#Jun24">blog</a>.

<img src="http://www.compunicate.com/Lamma-zine/Blog/2006-06/HEROposter888-Eng.gif">

I think it's not a bad idea.
But one comment: in today's blog

This is frankly bullshit. If you think about it for a moment, for that much power to go through your circuits every time you turned on a light would burn the house down. This superstition probably has its origin in the fact that to ionise the gas the starter has to charge up to a high voltage, up to 1000V, (which is why there's a delay in most fluorescents, it's accumulating energy) then it's released in a very short time, giving a high power for a few milliseconds. So turning a fluorescent on and off doesn't use any significant amount of energy, though it possibly will reduce the life of the tube.

See also <a href="http://lightingdesignlab.com/articles/switching/switching_fluorescent.htm">Should I Turn Off Fluorescent Lighting When Leaving A Room?</a>
"... the spike of current draw normally lasts no longer than 1/10th of a second, and draws the equivalent of about 5 seconds of normal operation."

Your confusing your argument. James's argument is that switching on ALL the flourescents and neons in HK will consume a significant amount of energy - not that it is all going through one system, though I can't speak for the figure he quotes.

You rather defeat yourself, also, by your final quote that the start-up spike of current is 50 times normal operation. Now, switch on all the lights at more or less the same time and you have one hell of a draw-down on the system, probably sufficient for a brown-out at least.

No, you didn't understand what I meant.
If switching the lights on/off/on would use up the gigantic amount of energy James said, each light would be consuming megawatts. Your house would go up in a fireball every time you turned a light on.


Sorry again, no. Unless every person turned on their lights at the same millisecond. Millions of people turn on their TVs at the same time (more or less) to watch the football, or their daily soap operas, which would make a much bigger surge.

I could crunch the numbers for this, but if you and James are so sure why don't you do some calculations. In particular, this rather precise "35 minutes of output" from the Lamma Power Station -- where did he get that number?

Alan you are right, it is bullshit, I calculated assuming every residential and commerical light in HK SAR takes part. Also 2004 figures for energy efficient fluorescent bulbs - and their use must have grown significantly in the last two years.

If I'd instead written "Puppy torturing by HK utility wastes same power as 35 minutes Lamma power plant operation" would this calculation receive more favour?

Anyway, I don't mean to be too negative. Lights Out is something fresh on the environmental scene, which is great - perhaps, since it is new it could avoid the mistakes of long-established "green" groups by getting friendly with the utilities, by acknowledging the "real world" of power generation.

Would the chief execs of both come to the press conference - really these are the only two people one needs to convince to turn off the power in Hong Kong But if they were really behind the campaign... If the environmentalists offered them a deal which had been worked out beforehand: Fit X technology to all the coal plant by 2008; we will publicly and individually support a Y increase in electricity price and concessions for the utilities in the new Scheme of Control, we will sign up now for green tarrifs; the air in HK will benefit by Z. I am not qualified to produce such a deal, but I am qualified to bring along to the press conference some info on clean coal technology, what is installed in HK already and what could be done - if anyone was interested!!

That's one option. But we can ask for more. It would be extremely satisying for a whole city to suddenly, unannounced, secretly and subversively, to go dark.... no word on how or why.... and to STAY dark... and then a message "This is Lights Out. We are one million people. We will turn the power back on when our demands are met."

And then we make like cavepeople until our demands are met. Think of all that "blackout camaraderie," as we light our paths with neon glowsticks, think of the world news coverage as we enter Week 4 without aircon and the government is still allowing those DISGUSTING diesel ferries to chug up and down our harbour all day long. Those factory owners across the border are still churning out crap from their chimneys. Meanwhile the utilities are using the breather to fit yet more advanced clean coal technology. Day-dreaming?

That would be more satisfying to me as a participant and an air-breather than turning the lights back on after three minutes, which would feel pointless and probably a bit of a letdown as the nightly 8pm lightshow continues its sweep across the harbour in Putonghua or English, whichever language it is in on August 8th.Let's hope it's in English if the world's press will be assembled in TST to watch the event, it will help them identify the buildings.

Some real numbers:

power output of coal units at Lamma Power Station: 2500 MW.
( http://www.hec.com.hk/hehWeb/AboutUs/Pu ... dex_en.htm )

So the 35 minutes of power:

35 minutes @ 2500 MW = 5,250,000 MJ

divide by 5 million houses: 1.05 MJ/house

If this surge was in one second: 1.05 MW running through your home when you flick the switch. If we say this is divided by 5 lights, makes it 210 kW/circuit
At 220 Volts, this is 954 Amps.

Light circuits are usually rated at 5 Amps. Power circuits at 15 Amps.

Thus turning on a light would overload all your circuits by a factor of 200, and of trip all your circuit breakers, if it didn't set your house on fire first.

(Actually, according to an earlier link, the surge is actually for 1/10 second, which would make 9450 Amps.)

Conclusion: bullshit.

OK?

In the meantime, James has conceded this point and admitted he might have exaggerated the numbers after I questioned him about them already:

"The calculation was very rough - lighting is 20% of the residential power in HK, 19% of commercial/industrial (air-con is 29% of commercial/industrial energy use), fluorescent lights are around 10% installed lighting and a regular fluorescent light ballast uses double its rated power for several seconds to switch on. I've also assumed 6 million people taking part.

The number is unimportant - I am willing to concede the point to Lights Out. It's not much power they'll be wasting after all, with a million people, and as you say, most residential lighting is incandescent.
<HR>
In the meantime, the Lights Out campaign has just announced::

"We have decided to delay the press launch until the following Sunday so that we do not clash with the democracy march.

We had some great news today, Louise Easterwell has managed to persuade the Kowloon Dairies to put up posters in all of their shops.

These shops being, 7-11, Mannings, Welcome, Ikea and a few others..."

After a long, slow start they're finally gathering some serious momentum, it seems!

Their website is up as well: http://lightsout.com.hk.

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Nice of him to admit it, but actually NO power is "wasted". If you turn off your light for at least 5 seconds you'll be using less energy than leaving it on.

I've just realised that "mossuie" is probably James. If so, I hope I haven't offended him; I just think that if you quote a figure it should have a basis in fact.

forget about it-

More email from the campaign:

"As I do not want people to get crossed wires regarding our aims with lights out HK, I will keep it short, so as not to conFUSE. A small circuit of friends has joined together to try and generate a massive public protest regarding our air pollution.

"We are asking people to join us on the Dark Side for three minutes. This visual protest may just switch those in charge on to just how bad things really are.
If we use 200 times the power usually needed during these three pinned minutes, so watt?

"It is the next twenty years that are important.
If the powers that be make one change, if this becomes the number one issue for debate in HK. This campaign will have been a possative.
So do not be negative, lend a hand and give this campaign a plug.

"Thank you. Cheers, Alastair.

"P.S. Please keep this debate light-hearted."

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I'm a bit concerned that on Lamma there are many instances wherein peoples lights are on but no-one is home. What should be done in these cases?
Also, in all seriousness, how do we know when the 3 minutes start?

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Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like bananas

8PM. The first "8" on the poster.

-- Just mentioned on Radio 3: 11:48 AM.

OK- not quite that thick! What I meant was will there be a countdown on TV or radio. I guess that if Radio 3 mentioned it they will be doing a countdown on air. What frequency is Radio 3 and can you get it online as reception is often dodgy?

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Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like bananas

If only there were some sort of device available to calculate the correct time. And if it were small enough one could wear it on their wrist and take it anywhere.

ok, i was trying to be lighthearted, i AM being light-hearted, i feel light-hearted but it might not read like that........... presenting.............

Keyser Soze survives the environmental holocaust

Back when I lived in Skokie, Illinois,
we once hid in the dark
from the barbershop quartet.
We'd killed our lights.
We would be hiding for more than fifteen minutes,
and it was energy efficient to do so.
And we hid.
We lay still.
And we remembered a happier time
in Hong Kong, with the lights out,
when we'd killed our lights,
but we'd not hid, we'd not lain still.
We'd partied hard and harder,
and we sang and shouted,
and screamed at the top of our lungs,
for this was our message then,
we're alive and we breathe!
This was before, years before,
and then the quartet's heavy carbon breath
suffocated us all,
and left our small band of survivors trembling,
and starved of oxygen,
hiding in the dark.

Dude, put the blunt down and step away- what in the name of googly-moogly could inspire such a thing?

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Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like bananas

Mr Granola, you're a true, honest-to-goodness visionary!

But could such a miracle of future technology ever become affordable for the average mass consumer and would be so stupid to wear such a heavy piece of hardware on their wrists. I wouldn't and I have the missing tan line to prove it!

Why would we need such a weird, single-function device anyway? My mobile phone shows the time and takes pictures and videos and measures my heart rate and blood pressure and displays the daily tides on Lamma up to the year 3798.

I'd suggest to call it a "Device to Register and Watch the Flow of Time", a Time-Watcher for short, or simply a "Watch".

Depending on country of orgin, a prefix would be added to the name to make them into brands and more disticnt from each other! For example a Brit-watch, a HK-Watch, or my favourite, a Swatch!
Does have a nice ring to it, no? Hopefully nobody has thought of it before!

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Um, where does that leave Rolex ... a maker of roll-up window blinds?

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Lead me not into temptation;
I can find it myself, thank you.

Ah, you mean those famous Rolex roll-up blinds that shady guys are hawking off to tourists all over Tsim Sha Tsui for as little as HK$250? One of HK's most famous brands and exports, known all over the world!

I hear these HK Rolexes have become so popular overseas that another shady company overseas actually stole the brand name Rolex from HK. They're making luxury versions of these cheap roll-up blinds now, some even made from gold and covered with diamonds all over, selling them for incredible amounts of money to stupid but rich people.

These shady, overseas company stealing the HK Rolex brand name is even so audacious to advertise their roll-up blinds on TV and in magazines showing sailboat races (with roll-up blinds in the sail?).

But who'd want a heavy golden roll-up blind covered all over with diamonds anyway! It's like an advertisement to the burglars outside to rob this flat first!

Maybe this company would do even better to invent some of these so-called, futuristic "devices to register and watch the flow of time"?
But why anyone would want to cover it with gold and diamonds, I'm not sure. Wouldn't it be like an open invitation to pickpockets and robbers of all kind?

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ROTFL !

My Dad was an old-school watchmaker, and I know he would have gotten a good laugh out of that explanation, L-G !

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Lead me not into temptation;
I can find it myself, thank you.

Alastair emailed this reply:

"I was not being serious, I found the whole argument a travasty of the human mind, that people can be so serious as to look at the minutest details without looking at the bigger picture. The guy who wrote the poem was funny, and everyone concerned should have taken it that way.

"I quite often stick a carrot up my bum and stroll with leisure around central Yung Shue Wan. I find this to be quite invigourating.

"I believe more people should try this, in fact it could be my next campaign."

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