City answers the call

On Saturday at 8:30 pm the Forbidden City was plunged into darkness and the lights went out at Beijing's Olympic venues, the Bird's Nest and Water Cube. At the same time the lights also dimmed in other major landmarks as well as many shopping centers and officice buildings.

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) started the Earth Hour campaign in 2007. Since then a growing number of individuals, communities, companies and governments all over the world have voluntarily turned off their lights for one hour on the last Saturday night of every March to promote the idea of energy conservation and carbon emission reduction.

So, across the globe as local clocks struck 8.30 pm, landmark buildings, such as the Sydney Opera House, the Grand Palace in Bangkok and the Eiffel Tower all turned off their lights.