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This year's Earth Hour marks the 10th tenth year the world's commitment to mitigating the effects of climate change. It was a global lights-out event on March 25 between 8:30 to 9:30 pm in your local time zone.

Earth Hour started as symbolic event in Sydney, Australia in 2007 organized by the environmental group Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF). The event was then a statement to show government leaders that the climate change issue is also important to ordinary citizens.

From there other nations followed suit, where last year's event achieved getting the commitment of 178 countries. This year's theme will be to highlight on the issue most significant to their country, the Telegraph reported.

The global event is highlighted by the symbolic lights out of the landmarks in different countries. This year the landmarks that have committed to the occasion include the Eiffel Tower, the Sydney Opera House, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Empire State Building, the Tokyo Tower and the Colosseum in Rome, the USA Today reported.

The global reach of the WWF has contributed to the event's success. While it does not dramatically bring down the greenhouse gas emissions, it is a symbolic gesture that says people around the world are willing to find ways to save and conserve energy. This also affirms the global commitment to slow down climate change and global warming.

The annual event's effect has been attributed to many policy changes in governments worldwide. In the course of a decade, WWF has been able to help rollout event-related changes. They were able to use the event's platform to rally the people's support in Paraguay for an extension of the logging moratorium. Argentina used the 2013 campaign to help pass a bill to establish over 3 million hectares of a Marine Protected Area in their country.

The global event is held in late March to coincide with the spring and autumn equinoxes, a time which allows the north and south hemisphere to have sunsets at the same time.