UNIVERSITY PARK – Beginning at 8:30 p.m. March 26, the exterior lights will be doused at Old Main, the Nittany Lion shrine, the Nittany Lion Inn and the Information Sciences and Technology Building for Earth Hour 2011. Penn State is participating in the global call to action by turning off decorative lighting at key University Park campus landmarks.
“We feel it is symbolically important to join in this worldwide effort to show the effect that many people, working together, can have on climate change,” said Steve Maruszewski, assistant vice president of Penn State’s Office of Physical Plant.
The University encourages students, faculty, staff and local businesses to participate in this effort by turning off their individual office and residential lights from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m. Penn State will be joining more than 2,700 cities in 83 countries in this event sponsored by the World Wildlife Fund. Other cultural icons that will go black include Chicago’s Sears Tower, the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, New York’s United Nations and Empire State Building, and the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
The campus community also is reminded to turn off unneeded lights and equipment every day during lunch, as part of the University’s continued commitment to environmental sustainability. For further information contact Paul Ruskin at 814-863-9620 or pdr2@psu.edu. To see a video about the global effort, visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y1pltLUNemE&NR online.