Today, April 22, 2021, we celebrate World Earth Day like we have every April 22 for the last fifty-one years. For the first event a crowd of young people gathered together in American streets, in Detroit, Los Angeles, and Washington. The backdrop for this news story was a large yellow and blue logo, the sun plunging into the sea: Earth Week 1970.
Today in France a movement is spreading, initiated by parkour clubs –Wizzy Gang in Rennes, On the Spot in Paris, Maxime and Yannis on their own in Marseille – which turn off shop signs in the streets at night, in order to fight light pollution. It’s a very short climb up to the outside light switch.
This is what curfew was in the past: having to cover the ashes in the hearth in the evening to limit the risk of fire. Today, if we are willing to give up the Ville lumière for a few hours before dawn, we can extend this ecological anniversary to the whole year, simply by remembering to turn off the lights.