Celebrate #daylighthour on June 17

June 13, 2016 - Current Sustainability Initiatives
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This Friday, June 17 is #daylighthour at SUNY New Paltz where we’re turning off the lights and dedicating one hour to sun power.
How you can participate:
  1. Turn off the lights in your day-lit office for at least one hour, beginning at noon today.
  2. Visit your neighbor’s day-lit office and remind him or her that it’s daylight hour time.
  3. Explore shared common spaces (ie. bathrooms, conference rooms, etc) around your office.  Can the lights in these spaces be turned off or only turned on when occupied?
Did you know… Our Campus Sustainability Plan reported that 45% of the campus’ electricity usage is due to lighting!
Why it’s important… Most offices have their lights on even when they are not needed. Spaces near exterior walls often receive enough daylight to work by, without the aid of electric lighting, but most often we leave the lights on anyway. This is a critical issue because the times when daylight is most available (workday afternoons) coincides with peak demand – the time when our our society demands the most energy from the grid. This peak energy is the most expensive energy, and typically the dirtiest and most harmful to our global climate because the oldest, least efficient plants are brought online to meet this need.