Wednesday, July 20, 2005

US Daylight Savings Proposal - Where Does That Leave Us?

The Ontario Government is having a good, long look at the U.S. legislative proposal to extend daylight savings time by two months. The purpose of the change is meant to save energy. See the Yahoo News!/Canadian Press article: Ontario government has its eye on America's daylight savings proposal .

From the article:

Canadian business leaders fear major economic disruption if this country does not fall in line. On Tuesday, the U.S. Congress quietly adopted a provision to extend daylight hours by two months.

...

McGuinty says Ontario doesn't want difficulties with its main trading partner, but there are business, environment and social issues to consider before the province follows suit.

"What are the environmental ups and downs of this? What are the business pros and cons? And then what about life for families? Does it make it more or less difficult?" McGuinty said.

"We're going to have to take a look at it obviously. We're not anxious to have a disconnect between us and our chief trading partner."

Daylight savings time is currently April through October in both countries. The U.S. is proposing to run it from the first weekend in March to the last weekend in November.

Let's hope the change doesn't leave us in the dark! (Oh, I can't resist such an obvious pun).

It appears, however, they have been reconsidering. There are concerns about how this will affect scheduling of flights. See the Houston Chronicle article from this morning: Daylight-saving plan has critics burning--

Proponents figure extra daylight in the evenings will help the nation save electricity. But juggling Americans' biorhythms, lawmakers learned, transcends the energy policy debate.

Critics started complaining loudly about children walking to school in the dark, airlines struggling to schedule flights overseas and technicians scrambling to recalibrate computers.

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