Quote:
Originally Posted by Smash
As far as I am concerned, if I am paying the power bill, its nobody's business but my own.
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That's an extremely short-sighted and selfish point of view.
Environmental issues are increasingly a major problem in the world, as you undoubtedly must be aware.
Unnecessary and frivolous uses of energy like this are a waste, and only hurt the environment. If they hook it up so that it runs purely on solar energy, then that alleviates the energy waste issue (although the $100,000 they spent to buy the lights still would have been better spent on charity or other uses).
But just because the city is a "pigsty" in terms of pollution doesn't mean that we should not care about even more garbage/pollution being thrown about. It's like the same people who say "
Why shouldn't I idle my car? The refinery is putting out way more pollution than me".
At least industrial uses like the refinery add economic value to the city; lights in the sky do not.
It also is light pollution in the simplest sense:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_pollution
"Light pollution is excess or obtrusive light created by humans. Among other effects, it:
- disrupts ecosystems
- can cause adverse health effects
- obscures the stars for city dwellers
- interferes with astronomical observatories
- and wastes energy.
Light pollution can be construed to have two main branches: (a) annoying light that intrudes on an otherwise natural or low light setting and (b) excessive light, generally indoors, that leads to worker discomfort and adverse health effects. Since the early 1980s, a global dark-sky movement has emerged, with concerned people campaigning to reduce the amount of light pollution."
It's not on the same scale as a big city skyline, but it's still a waste.