On 10/10/2010 activities, designed to raise awareness of the need to reduce our energy footprint, took place in 128 countries across the globe.
In Greece, Climate Advocates joined forces with the NGO Action Aid Hellas and the Green Design Festival to invite young students and their parents to an event in Syntagma Square, central Athens, to play a quiz called Do you want to get 10:10?

The quiz was hosted by a panel of experts comprising of Climate Advocates and an Action Aid representative. These experts invited young participants to compete against their parents and challenged their knowledge (and imagination!) on facts about energy, carbon footprints, life-cycle analysis of items of our daily lives, biodiversity and the global consequences of climate change.

The quiz was played in two sessions, one in the morning and one in the afternoon and despite the drizzling and cloudy weather, both sessions attracted bikers, passer-bys and families who stood to watch. The young winners received a translated copy of the book ‘Save the Planet’ by British author Natalia Marshall (kindly sponsored by Hellenic Post Bank) as well as a useful ‘energy award’ in the form of an energy-saver light bulb to use at home.

Climate Advocates also invited young participants to try a hand-crank-powered generator to literally give people a feel of how much energy it takes to light up 12 bulbs which illuminated a 10:10 sign. It was not as easy as you would think! One of the attending parents commented that, “this is an excellent way for children to realize the true value of energy.”

Action Aid representatives and Green Design Festival organisers said that they were amazed by the children’s enthusiastic participation to the quiz game, adding that the event gave them a new, fresh way of communicating important information about climate change to young children, one they will be definitely be using again in the future.

The event on 10/10/2010 is the first part of the new Challenge Europe ‘10:10 school project’ which is a fun competition surrounding energy consumption between 10 schools in central Athens