Forty Two: Saying NO to DST

http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=90815

The first thing that struck me about the news was that we are set to start DST without deciding how long it is to continue. The overall ease with which this decision was taken amidst so many other pressing national concerns shows that not much consideration was given to it. This bothered me as I always considered Daylight Saving to cause much unnecessary confusion and hassle.

So I started googling and learnt that Japan and Taiwan are not DST observing countries at present. Given that the Prime Minister's press secretary cited these countries as examples in the above mentioned news item and the general state of the country, I became more concerned that not enough planning and thought has been given to the decision. Our politicians are well known for their lack of farsightedness.

First of all, it is generally known that DST is for countries in high latitudes. “Equatorial and tropical countries (lower latitudes) generally do not observe Daylight Saving Time. Since the daylight hours are similar during every season, there is no advantage to moving clocks forward during the summer.” The basis of the idea in general and its popularity in regions where the sun sets early is that it gives the sun-craving people more time for outdoor activities.

Secondly, from the varied sources available on the internet, no studies could prove any benefits in terms of electricity usage savings, and some recent ones like one by California Energy Commission suggest otherwise. Personally, I do not care much for statistical data. The lack of it in number driven first-world countries which have adopted the DST is conspicuous though.

A developing South Africa have analyzed possible advantages and many others tried it out but then decided against it. In Western Australia, four referendums in 1975, 1984, 1992 and 2009 have rejected DST. Japan discontinued use of DST due to concerns by farmers and the Ministry of Education. Major industrial countries China and India do not observe any form of daylight saving. In fact, only 6 (Syria, Iran, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Pakistan) countries in Asia and 4 (Canary Islands, Egypt, Morocco, Namibia) in Africa will be observing DST in 2009. Alaska has put forward a bill to end its DST in 2009.

So to the 'dillogical' argument - why not us if THE west does it?, I point out that for the 71 + 10 partial countries that observe DST, there are 135 that do not. Please let us use some basic intelligence to determine what is viable for our socio-economic and geographic conditions. What percentage of electricity is consumed in the households? Why is the usage peak at evenings? Where is the bottleneck? Let us not blindly follow people on the opposite spectrum, whose avant-grade minds with larger than life challenges do backfire- look at list of countries having highest number of psychopaths and serial killers.

Thirdly, let us consider how DST may help. Power is saved by going earlier to bed. But will this not be is offset by the extra fans (and ACs) used in the hot after noon hour thus spent at home and by the lights needed in getting up in the earlier darker hours? My uncommon common sense tells me that offices, factories and most cramped residences will put on lights and fans as long as they have their inmates, and of course electric supply! The non-tech farmers and their chickens will continue to rise and work by the sun. Then there are the majority (yes, well over 50%) who are altogether deprived of electricity supply.

Even if we just assume that there may be benefits, will it not be a much simple alternative to only change the office hours? With respect to GMT, what DST effectively does is shift the 'waking' hours one hour ahead. So if we shift the school and working hours, it will have the same effect, assuming that people rising one hour early will not sleep one hour less. I concede I am at a loss as to why the modern countries did not adopt the office-hour shift alternative. For some the reason could be the costs of changing an established system. It could also by all means be a cultural difference, where they prefer to change the clocks rather than their 'individual' timetable. Why does America not use A4 size paper and not practice the metric system - their pick!

Lastly, let me counter 'what is the harm in trying?' Well...it is a positive attitude, for a person to ‘try’ what he/she may fancy. But on a national level, there can be no justification for reinventing the square wheel and make 160 million people follow a debated method.

Summary so far - if we were really serious about conserving energy, dozens of other moves would do so far more efficiently. DST looks to me as a political pretense to improve life in a single stroke. With outages every alternate hour, I do NOT care if I have 15 minutes more of electricity per day.

Now let us look at the disadvantages. I say NO to it because the 'harm' is in the havoc and confusion it creates. It is more than adjusting the clocks twice every year. We may disregard the finer effects on sleep patterns, even the inconveniences and confusions of forgetting to change clocks. Much effort of the 'committee' is needed to reach the remote areas with awareness and proper communication of the shifts.

The major complexity arises as an hour will be missing altogether and another hour will be repeated twice consecutively in a one year time frame. One can stretch the business-operational effects this may have to all processes. The length of the day becomes variable which will disrupt record management, broadcasts, billing processes, airline and other scheduling systems, for starters.

Also critical is that software applications, networks, high-end medical equipments and most automated systems will have to be reprogrammed to accommodate this time shift effect. The places that will be affected are almost endless even in our to-be-digitalized-in-2021 society. Only an extension to DST time span cost an advanced and experienced North America some $500 million to $1 billion in 2007. So there should be a huge cost involved too.

And the rest of the world has to be informed and given the time to support and synchronize with our new yet unnamed time zone. I do not like to set my online and mobile locations as Bangkok -with timezone GMT +7 to be able to sync calls and meetings with people outside the country.

On a personal philosophical perspective, I find it a pretentious make belief thing to do. Time we know waits for none and there is no point in trying to save, change or travel it!!