More light?

I ran across an article in the local paper about the change in daylight savings time that is scheduled to begin in 2007. First time I even heard about it. In 2007, the U.S. intends to move the dates for daylight savings changeover three weeks earlier in spring and a week later in fall.

This is supposed to save energy.

This is Mr. Bush's solution to the energy crisis? It's a bit like putting weather stripping around the window but leaving the door wide open all winter. (and yes, I know there was more to the bill than DST, but not much)

The big concern that I've heard so far while reading up on it is that schoolchildren will walk to school in the dark for those few weeks. No problem around here. I think my kids are the only ones who actually walk to school (their school's are 10 minutes and 15 minutes away). They're constantly getting rides home from friend's parents, though I'm not sure why since there seems to be little call for it. Hmmm... maybe those friend's parents would give me a ride to the bus stop too? It's about as far from the house as their schools are. But I digress.

So now the question with daylight savings is whether Canada is going to follow suit. From what I've seen on the internet, there seems to be much more talk about the potential consquences of following suit than took place in the U.S. Several blogs and sites here seemed as surprised by the announcement as I was. The only ones that aren't are the techies who recognize the problems with producing flexible or two versions of software that recognizes time depending on which side of the border they'll be used on.

CTV actually has a pretty decent article on daylight savings and premiers' responses to the U.S.'s move to adopt the altered scheme. They bring up some pretty interesting points, and since we're much farther north, the concern about reducing the amount of light in the morning is a more serious question than in is in say Florida. And Florida doesn't ever have black ice either, which is difficult to see in the dark.

Wikipedia has a really good (and of course very up-to-date) entry for DST if you're curious.