Brunei saves 231MW during Earth Hour

BRUNEI saved about 231 megawatt (MW) of energy during Saturday's one-hour lights out to mark Earth Hour, a graph released yesterday by the Department of Electrical Services (DES) showed.

The DES graph indicated that the Sultanate's power usage during the one-hour energy saving event declined by 38.5MWh (Megawatt-hour) every 10 minutes. Earth Hour's switch off started at 8.30pm up to 9.30pm.

Based on renewable energy website, Megawatt (MW) is a standard unit of electrical power equal to 1,000 kilowatts, or 1 million watts while Megawatt-hour (MWh) is one megawatt acting over a period of 1 hour.

The graph also compared Brunei's electrical consumption on March 26 with that of March 27.

On March 26, the recorded energy usage at 8.30pm was 466.44MW compared to the consumption rate of 432.46MW recorded at the same time on the night Earth Hour was observed.

By 9pm of March 27, the electrical usage went down to 419.40 MW and down to 413.61 MW by 9.30pm while data recorded at the same time on March 26, showed energy consumption was at 450.09 MW, according to Asrul Sany Hj Mohammad Ali, an official from DES.

However, he noted that this encouraging result could be due to other factors, apart from the energy-saving initiative.

Asrul Sany added the campaign was effective and that Bruneians were now more aware of the adverse effects of global warming and pollution.

One of the representatives for Earth Hour Brunei, Hj Md Zaim Azman Hj Ismail, said that the result was impressive. "If we could sustain like this every hour, (then) we can probably come to a closer terms in the future to finding a true solution to climate change and energy conservation."

He said that he was also overwhelmed by the encouraging response by both private and government sectors in supporting the global fight against climate change.

He noted that the hotels in the nation have also started going "green" by supporting the cause.

"On a personal note, I would like to say congratulations and thank you to all the people involved in making the event possible, we hope that we can continue the efforts and make them better in the future," Hj Md Zaim said.

He added: "We are not trying to gain recognition from other countries, but we try to gain recognition from citizens of the planet, in which we hope we did last night."

Brunei plunged into darkness for at least one hour on the night of Earth Hour 2010, with the centre of focus being the Kg Ayer Cultural and Tourism Gallery in the capital.

Other buildings and locations including The Mall Cineplex, also did their part in energy conservation by switching off their neon lightings in the main lobby.

One of the cineplex supervisors said their participation in Earth Hour was spontaneous and was only to show their care for the environment by switching off their lights in the cineplex.

To lighten up the darkness, Gofigures Toys & Collectibles, gathered a group of Star Wars fans who brought their "lightsabres" which illuminated in the dark.

Joey Hamidon, a passerby, said that he didn't expect to see The Mall take part in Earth Hour as it's a commercial area and the official celebration was in the capital. He suggested that they could have turned off the televisions that were showing the movie trailers but enjoyed the idea of using lightsabres instead of candles.

"I thought it was a cool idea. I think that its a perfect replacement for candles as it is pretty much has the same function as a torchlight but with a unique science fiction twist," he said.

His sister, Nina said that she felt like going to The Mall at the time because she wasn't really into the Earth Hour idea.

"I would've been frustrated if the whole mall had been off but it didn't occur to me at first, that the cinema was participating in Earth Hour, then I realised when I saw the lightsabres and it was a good move."The Brunei Times