9 ms·

European MPs vote to end summer time clock changes

214 points by bjakubski 8y ago

wongarsu 8y ago
I'm glad we are getting rid of daylight savings time. It's a biannual disruption of sleep cycles that costs lives (in increased accident rates) for at best marginal benefits: for most of europe sunrise and sunset times change too fast for an additional hour to really matter. Still, I think given the choice most people would have prefered to stay in summer time instead of winter time (or equivalently: to abolish DST and move the timezone by one hour). The actual proposal is only 8 pages long and also worth a read [1] 1: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2018/630308/EPRS_BRI(2018)630308_EN.pdf http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2018/63030...
- renholder 8y ago
  >Under the new legislation, governments opting to make summer time permanent would adjust their clocks for the last time on the last Sunday in March 2021. For those choosing permanent standard time - also called winter time - the final clock change would be on the last Sunday of October 2021. It's down to the member states to decide but I think most would prefer summer; save for maybe the Nordics, where the vast difference in the amount of daylight hours makes quite a significant difference. Edit: Removed Iceland, since they froze their EU application.
  - semi-extrinsic 8y ago
    Even in the Nordics, eternal summer time would be preferrable for most people I think. It gives you more sunlight in the afternoon (if I'm not mistaken), when you actually have some free time to utilize that fact. Who cares if it's light or dark in the morning, nobody is outside enjoying the weather at that time anyway, we're just trying to get everyone to school/work.
    - renholder 8y ago
      In my county (Östergötland), the sun starts rising at 3am around this time of year; so, the concept of it being light or dark in the morning (or afternoon/night) isn't really a concern (overall). In places like Kiruna, the sun will never set for about two weeks[0], during the summertime. It's the amount of actual daytime during the winter that would principally matter - in the overall scheme of things. [0] - https://www.kirunalapland.se/en/see-do/midnight-sun-2/ https://www.kirunalapland.se/en/see-do/midnight-sun-2/
      - semi-extrinsic 8y ago
        FWIW I live a bit further north, at 63 degrees. In winter, at least december and january, we're in the state of "dark when you go to work, dark when you go home". However for the approx. two months between autumn equinox and end of november, and similar two months from end of january to spring equinox, having one more hour of daylight in the afternoon would be really really nice.
    - Lunanne 8y ago
      When I had to bike 6km to school in the Netherlands I was always very happy with the DST switch to wintertime because it meant biking in daylight a bit longer. In summertime sunrise would be at 9:48 am - I really think that is quite late.
    - oarsinsync 8y ago
      I leave every morning at 5.30am. I literally see many others (but clearly a minority of peoples) doing the same. It's much nicer doing that in daylight than in darkness, although it was also nice watching the sun rise during my morning swim a couple of months ago.
    - posterboy 8y ago
      Some people have tonwork outsides? Sun light also helps to wake up. So it's a trade off either way.
  - FearNotDaniel 8y ago
    Iceland is not in the EU. And also has no land borders with member states. So it doesn't really matter what they choose to do from a Europe-wide perspective.
    - renholder 8y ago
      Fixed. I didn't realise they had frozen their application.
  - madcaptenor 8y ago
    Iceland is already on permanent summer time. Reykjavik is at longitude 22 degrees west, so they're "naturally" in GMT-1 (and close to the line with GMT-2) but they use GMT year-round. (The country as a whole is between 13 degrees west and 25 degrees west.)
  - qalmakka 8y ago
    I think countries on a blatantly wrong timezone such as Spain should take this opportunity to fix it. For instance, Spain could stay in UTC+1 all year round and go back in the same timezone as Portugal (which is going to certainly pick its summer time as its whole-year round timezone), thus eliminating the artificial shift everything has there (people eat lunch at 14 and dinner at 22, but these times match roughly with 13 and 21 in solar time).
    - mcjiggerlog 8y ago
      What exactly makes it "wrong"? I live in Spain and am perfectly happy with our current timezone and daylight saving. Staying on Winter time just means we get an hour of useless light long before anybody has woken up and take it away from the evening where it is far more appreciated. The spanish public have already been shown to be massively in favor of staying on UTC+2 year-round, though this would mean that the sun wouldn't rise till 0930 in the depths of Winter. I think once the government actually stops and takes a look at the repercussions of all options we will end up carrying on with the status quo.
    - wongarsu 8y ago
      I would argue Portugal is the one in the "wrong" timezone here. If you want the sun to be at its high point at noon, Spain is obviously in the wrong time zone. But you see plenty of countries around the world choosing a slightly different timezone to facilitate trade and communication with some other country (or within itself, in the case of larger countries). With most other barriers to trade gone within the eurozone having to convert timezones is a significant inconvinience that (in the mind of many) outweighs having the sun in slightly the wrong place.
      - allannienhuis 8y ago
        Why would you want the sun to be at it's high point at noon? Perhaps that has value in an agricultural society, but in today's world I'd much rather have more daylight in my leisure hours (evening) than my working hours.
        8y ago
  - qwsxyh 8y ago
    Here in the UK permenant summer time would mean sunrise would be 9am during the depths of winter. That sounds like a great way to make more accidents (as everyone is now driving to work in the dark at 8am) and also make the seasonal depression worse.
    - bunderbunder 8y ago
      Southern Britain gets just over 8 hours of sunlight in the middle of winter. Meaning you can choose between people driving to work with the sun up, or driving home from work with the sun up, but you can't have both. So I guess we'll just have to decide whether people would rather get hit by cars just after breakfast or just before dinner.
      - qwsxyh 8y ago
        Permenant winter time means that school hours in Winter are entirely contained within sunlight hours. Permenant summer time means that kids are walking to school in the dark. I'd rather not have them hit by drivers also driving in the dark.
        deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
        cr1895 8y ago
        >kids are walking to school in the dark. As they already do in many other places. Why should this be particularly dangerous for the UK compared to elsewhere?
        wongarsu 8y ago
        The potential effects on mood and freetime activities of having all sunlight hours fall into school hours sound more serious than walking to school in the dark (most places where you walk are already illuminated quite well)
        nicoburns 8y ago
        I'd much rather school kids had time to play in the light after school.
- Asooka 8y ago
  I'm only aware of Russia switching to permanent summer time in recent memory and they switched back to permanent winter time two years later because the long dark winter mornings were unbearable. Also, your circadian rhythm doesn't care for where the hand on the clock is and doesn't like being pushed too far outside of where you naturally would have it. It would be best to keep the clock as close to astronomical time as the timezone system allows and adjust certain business times if required to be off the standard 9-to-5. Which already happens.
setr 8y ago
>The proposal would give each member state a choice from 2021: either to keep the current summer time system or scrap the twice-yearly clock changes So if you travelled vertically within a timezone, you could end up going back and forth by an hour repeatedly, depending on the state’s decision made here? Truly, a design made by committee.
- wongarsu 8y ago
  Outside the EU that's already true, even between countries that all observe DST (since start and end times of DST vary). But having most of the EU in the same time zone with the same DST rules was very convinient.
- seszett 8y ago
  That's already what happens if you go from France to the UK or Spain to Portugal, so it's not really something new.
  - FearNotDaniel 8y ago
    UK/France isn't such an issue, there's a big stretch of water in between that takes a minimum of an hour to get across by any mode of transport (once you factor in waiting/boarding time). Not sure how many people make daily border crossings between Spain/Portugal like those I described in my other comment, but even then it is something new if the time difference between states varies with the time of year. In short, if your country opts out of summer time but your close neighbours don't, all those living in densely populated border areas are still affected by the summer time changes, only with the added complexity that your neighbours in the next suburb don't always keep the same time that you do...
- renholder 8y ago
  >So if you travelled vertically within a timezone, you could end up going back and forth by an hour repeatedly, depending on the state’s decision made here? See: Arizona
  - 8y ago
avar 8y ago
> There were 4.6 million replies [to the online] consultation, 70% of which were from Germans. Germans make up around 15% of the EU population. So by this metric they've got an out-sized democratic participation in the EU by a factor of almost 5x. As seen on a solar map [1][2] Germany isn't even particularly badly impacted by this issue compared to say France or Spain. There's some truth to the saying that Germany basically runs the EU, but as results like this show mostly because they seem to be making an effort to give a crap about it and its policies. 1. http://blog.poormansmath.net/images/SolarTimeVsStandardTimeV2.png http://blog.poormansmath.net/images/SolarTimeVsStandardTimeV... (source: http://blog.poormansmath.net/how-much-is-time-wrong-around-the-world/ http://blog.poormansmath.net/how-much-is-time-wrong-around-t...)
- seszett 8y ago
  There were other consultations though. In the French poll, 2 million answers were given and 84% were also in favor of ending time savings, 60% wanted to keep summer time rather than winter time. For some reason, people often take France and Spain as examples of countries that would be badly impacted by a decision "taken by the Germans", but France and Spain are very much in favor of staying on summer time. I don't know if the BBC is trying to push the idea that the decision is somehow undemocratic, but most countries in the EU have had consultations and as far as I know the results were in favor of giving up time savings everywhere.
  - avar 8y ago
    What survey are you referring to? I mean the one the EU did: http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-5302_en.htm http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-5302_en.htm Either you're mis-recalling that "2 million" number for France, or very coincidentally there was some poll specific to France whose result in France was exactly the same (84%) as the one the Commission conducted across the EU. In any case, whether citizens in specific EU countries participate in polls held locally or held by member states isn't relevant if we're discussing how much citizens in various countries directly engage with EU institutions.
    - 8y ago
johannes1234321 8y ago
Mind that this is just a step in the legislative process not the final thing. Next step is the EU Council where relevant ministers of the individual member states have to find an agreement. Some governments aren't that enthusiastic ..
- dpark 8y ago
  Do all of them actually have to agree or just some majority?
  - johannes1234321 8y ago
    This is always so complicated and I do not know. Sometimes they need a simple majority representing so and so many citizens and so and so many different countries (i.e. so that big countries [De+Fr+UK] can't overrule small ones and the small ones can't overrule big ones) some hings have to be unanimous, sometimes a simple majority is enough ...
FearNotDaniel 8y ago
I don't have a strong opinion on whether we're better off with or without the seasonal time change. But I don't like the idea of individual member states opting in or out, which is what this ruling allows. I've lived the past few years in a border town where many people will live in Germany and commute to Austria, or live in Austria but do their regular shopping in Germany, or regularly go on weekend mountain hikes that may cross the border multiple times. Hopefully the authorities are smart enough to avoid the kind of situation where the two regions would end up in different time zones for half the year and all the ensuing confusion over bus and train times, opening hours and so on.
- chapium 8y ago
  Think about what time change does to hospitals and other critical services. Many systems, but not all are based on UTC and at some point the information needs to be interfaced to a human with the expectation of clocks being a certain way.
- Dumbdo 8y ago
  I think you misunderstood that bit, see this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19491551 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19491551
  - FearNotDaniel 8y ago
    Well yes, I believed the BBC reporter's description of the proposal instead of bothering to read the source document. That's thankfully a bit less ludicrous than what the article suggested.
- taejo 8y ago
  > two regions would end up in different time zones for half the year AIUI, every pair of countries will (like now) either always be in the same time zone or always be in different ones. Daylight Savings Time is being abolished; the choice is whether the permanent time zone will be the current summer one or the current winter one. Germany and Austria, being closely connected and at simular longitudes will probably choose the same one. Currently Germany shares a timezone with all of it's neighbours. Most Germans seem to think they would prefer UTC+2; there would probably be no reason in that case for Germany's eastern neighbours (including Austria) to go to UTC+1. It's Germany's western neighbours that might end up on a different timezone. Certainly permanent UTC+2 seems crazy for Spain (which is geographically in the UTC zone); France and the Benelux countries are more of a toss-up.
sergioisidoro 8y ago
The news is not correct. Member states cannot chose to keep the daylight savings, but they will have to choose between keeping the summer time or winter time. This is to ensure uniform time keeping in the union to reduce trade costs. quote: "Consequently, the Commission proposes to discontinue the seasonal time changes in the Union, while ensuring that Member States retain the competence to decide on their standard time, in particular whether they will move to the standard time corresponding to their summer-time on a permanent basis or whether they will apply their current standard time permanently. " https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:52018PC0639&from=EN https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELE...
demircancelebi 8y ago
Turkey removed DST in 2017 after 47 years, and it did not cause much trouble.
- Asooka 8y ago
  And Turkey is on winter time, not summer time. Istanbul is technically closer to being on its local summer time equivalent, but most of Turkey is practically on winter time. It seems the muslim world is again leading in its scientific understanding compared to the backwards west.
  - i6tjvo 8y ago
    Yes, it must be that.
  - dang 8y ago
    If you troll HN like that again we will ban you.
seba_dos1 8y ago
RIP 0h Game Jam [*] http://0hgame.eu/ http://0hgame.eu/
- shanehoban 8y ago
  What the..
seanalltogether 8y ago
People often say they would rather have permanent summer time, but from observation it seems everyone sets their rhythm around solar noon regardless, so why not make noon = noon. During the summer months Spain's solar noon is between 2 and 2:30pm. Guess what time Spaniards sit down to eat lunch? In the summer the UKs solar noon is around 1pm, guess what time all the office workers pour out on the streets to eat lunch.
- otabdeveloper1 8y ago
  Because in the northern latitudes there is no such thing as 'noon'.
  - delinka 8y ago
    There is indeed a highest point the sun reaches during the day. It's known as "solar noon."
  - rfergie 8y ago
    I don't understand? Are you talking about days in winter where the sun doesn't rise at all?
    - otabdeveloper1 8y ago
      No, I'm talking about the fact that "noon" has no cultural or practical significance if the solar day changes wildly during the year.
  - ceejayoz 8y ago
    There's something like a million people in the entire world subject to that edge case. 0.014% of the world doesn't have a solar noon for at least one day a year. I'd say that's not enough to avoid fixing timezones for the other 99.99%.
- aequitas 8y ago
  Summertime sounds better than wintertime because of the association with summer. Give people the choice between UTC+1 or UTC+2 and you will get wildly different answers.
mabbo 8y ago
> The European Parliament has backed a proposal to stop the obligatory one-hour clock change which extends daylight hours in summer EU-wide. > which extends daylight hours No, it doesn't. The number of daylight hours is exactly the same no matter what your clocks do. All DST does is force everyone to change their schedules so that they wake up earlier, go to work earlier, come home earlier, and go to bed earlier. It effectively forces businesses to open an hour earlier and close an hour earlier because of society's expectations. When you describe it this way, the entire process sounds like something that takes place in a totalitarian state run by a crazy person. Yet here we are as a group claiming it somehow helps farmers (it doesn't, it makes things more challenging for them). The only people who truly benefit from DST are golfers (and golf course owners) who can leave work an hour early and get in a few more rounds.
- dezzeus 8y ago
  > When you describe it this way Which is by far one of the most accurate description in this community. > the entire process sounds like something that takes place in a totalitarian state run by a crazy person It's due to the way the Universe works, it only requires a review of your early school notes about science / geography / astronomy. DST is a way to compensate that "strange" behavior for the current definition of a "time-zone". Is DST good ? it depends because we over-generalize the definition of a "time-zone" by taking in consideration only the longitude, but not the latitude. (and above/below certain latitudes, nothing can be done) Is DST good for EU (or North America) ? Mostly yes if you take a closer look at the year-round daylight charts for key geographic coordinates. Extra notes while here: 1) "EU propose to get rid of DST", its our best interest to keep it; don't let some incompetent rule such a thing because he/she doesn't really know how it works but only how it's perceived. 2) "If I have to choose, I prefer more daylight in the evening": fine, but that is out of scope from DST; it's about changing schedules. Clock should (I'd say "must") stay on their natural "time-zone" for the sake of coordination and travel.
nikanj 8y ago
Conveniently this is going to steal a lot of press from the copyright reform
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
tilolebo 8y ago
I have been wondering for a while: will this decision trigger any significant work to make software compatible? Or is it "just" a timezone library to update and voila?
- notatoad 8y ago
  it's just a tz library to update, assuming you're using a tz library. Any poorly localized software is going to have issues. The challenge is actually getting that update pushed out to everything that needs it. Every embedded and IoT device needs to get a new tz database, and any applications that might use a different tz database to the system one need to be updated. It's not significant programming work necessarily, but it's still probably going to cause a significant number of bugs in reality.
ridgewell 8y ago
I recognize that this is probably an unpopular opinion but I live for the days when the sun sets at 9pm. DST really factors in quite well for night owls like myself. I'm aware there is a strong degree of detraction in terms of complicating time keeping and body clock adjustments. It makes the daylight stretch into what we conventionally consider the night. In the winter, I'm always somewhat a little sad that the sun sets before I even leave the office (~4-4:30pm), but I'm always in a much better mood in the summer when I leave the office at 5pm and still have hours of daylight left in the day.
- dsfyu404ed 8y ago
  The late evening sunset in the summer is a godsend for anyone who has a day job and has projects they need to work on outdoors. It's like having every weekday followed by a Saturday afternoon for productivity purposes.
- pmontra 8y ago
  I'm not particularly a night owls but sunset at 9 PM or 10 PM in June is much better than wasting sunlight when people are sleeping at 5 or 6 AM (which is my country is pretty much all of us.) I'll vote for permanent summer time if we'll have to make a choice by holding a referendum.
1337biz 8y ago
Not bad, they now at least understand the basics of PR! Always combine an unpopular decision (uploadfilter) with a popular one (summer time).
wazoox 8y ago
People vote for "summer time" because they, d'oh, prefer summer. But summer time in winter is atrocious. And there are many people getting up early, they're (mostly) called "the poor", those generally brown people who clean up your office hours before you come in, prepare food early so that you can eat at noon, collect trash, etc. I know, they don't vote and don't really count, who cares if they can't see the daylight all winter long? Yeah, that's a cynical take on the class orientation of HN... (I don't get up at 5 and never ever reach the office before 10:30 myself).
- jedberg 8y ago
  I don't think you're right that it's mostly poor people who get up early, but even if it is, they would benefit even more from permanent summer time. There would still be sunlight after they get off work, and if they started their shift at 5am, then they get a whole lot of sunlight after work, an hour more than they would otherwise.
tzs 8y ago
It's really a simple question. How should you approximate this curve? ....................*****..... .................***.....**... ................*..........**. *.............**.............* .**..........*................ ...**.....***................. .....*****.................... If you think it should be this, you want permanent standard time: .............................. .............................. .............................. ****************************** .............................. .............................. .............................. If you think it should be this, you want permanent summer time: .............................. .............................. ****************************** .............................. .............................. .............................. .............................. If you think it should be something like this, you want some kind of DST system: .............................. .............................. ****..........**************** .............................. ....*********................. .............................. ..............................
- sixothree 8y ago
  There are two curves to account - sunrise and sunset. Daylight savings attempts to flatten one of those and not the other!
  - dezzeus 8y ago
    Yes, because DST correctly attempt to adjusts Sunrise towards our usual wake-up time (obviously it can't do miracles).
bbojan 8y ago
I hated DST, but now that I have kids I really like it - it means in the summer I have one more hour of sunlight to play with them outside after I come back from work.
throwaway123001 8y ago
The consultations might have had a different result if there had been a practical multiple-choice test with questions that link the idea of DST to actual consequences. Like: Would you like to go to work in the light or in the dark during winter time? Would you like to have some daylight while having barbecue at 9pm in the summer. ... (My concern is that people had no idea of the practical consequences beside sucks-to-have-to-get-up-one-hour-earlier and will be in for a rude awakening)
- acqq 8y ago
  Exactly. Basing the policy of the whole Union on the internet votes is... just wrong.
- nybble41 8y ago
  Whether you go to work in the light or in the dark is determined by your work schedule relative to the local solar day/night cycle. Not DST. If you want to drive to work in daylight, negotiate for your working hours to start after sunrise. If you'd prefer some sunlight after work ends, negotiate for your working hours to end before sunset. Keep in mind that you won't get both year-round at most latitudes simply because a typical work day is longer than the length of visible daylight in winter. (What would probably make the most sense would be 10-12 hour work days in the summer and 4-6 hour work days in the winter, centered around solar noon, but that's likely to face strong opposition from both sides.) The only _practical_ consequences of DST vs non-DST lie in whether we try to force everyone to shift their schedules all at once twice a year or leave it to individuals and businesses to set their schedules as they see fit. There are no practical consequences for permanent-standard-time vs. permanent-summer-time. Either way, people will adjust their schedules to suit local conditions just as they do now, but without the complication of abrupt time changes in the spring and fall. My preference would be to place local noon as close as possible to solar noon (+/- 45 minutes, to permit one-hour time zone offsets without splitting up dense urban areas) so that morning and afternoon are approximately the same length, but I wouldn't call that a _practical_ difference, as long as the offset from solar noon is consistent. It's more a matter of aesthetics, in particular a distaste for needless complexity.
  - 8y ago
JohannesH 8y ago
Made this little visualization of the night/dawn/sunrise/day/sunset/dusk/night times throughout the year. https://codepen.io/JohannesEH/full/JzVgeR https://codepen.io/JohannesEH/full/JzVgeR

214 points by bjakubski 8y ago

I'm glad we are getting rid of daylight savings time. It's a biannual disruption of sleep cycles that costs lives (in increased accident rates) for at best marginal benefits: for most of europe sunrise and sunset times change too fast for an additional hour to really matter. Still, I think given the choice most people would have prefered to stay in summer time instead of winter time (or equivalently: to abolish DST and move the timezone by one hour). The actual proposal is only 8 pages long and also worth a read [1] 1: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2018/630308/EPRS_BRI(2018)630308_EN.pdf http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2018/63030...

renholder 8y ago
>Under the new legislation, governments opting to make summer time permanent would adjust their clocks for the last time on the last Sunday in March 2021. For those choosing permanent standard time - also called winter time - the final clock change would be on the last Sunday of October 2021. It's down to the member states to decide but I think most would prefer summer; save for maybe the Nordics, where the vast difference in the amount of daylight hours makes quite a significant difference. Edit: Removed Iceland, since they froze their EU application.
- semi-extrinsic 8y ago
  Even in the Nordics, eternal summer time would be preferrable for most people I think. It gives you more sunlight in the afternoon (if I'm not mistaken), when you actually have some free time to utilize that fact. Who cares if it's light or dark in the morning, nobody is outside enjoying the weather at that time anyway, we're just trying to get everyone to school/work.
  - renholder 8y ago
    In my county (Östergötland), the sun starts rising at 3am around this time of year; so, the concept of it being light or dark in the morning (or afternoon/night) isn't really a concern (overall). In places like Kiruna, the sun will never set for about two weeks[0], during the summertime. It's the amount of actual daytime during the winter that would principally matter - in the overall scheme of things. [0] - https://www.kirunalapland.se/en/see-do/midnight-sun-2/ https://www.kirunalapland.se/en/see-do/midnight-sun-2/
    - semi-extrinsic 8y ago
      FWIW I live a bit further north, at 63 degrees. In winter, at least december and january, we're in the state of "dark when you go to work, dark when you go home". However for the approx. two months between autumn equinox and end of november, and similar two months from end of january to spring equinox, having one more hour of daylight in the afternoon would be really really nice.
  - Lunanne 8y ago
    When I had to bike 6km to school in the Netherlands I was always very happy with the DST switch to wintertime because it meant biking in daylight a bit longer. In summertime sunrise would be at 9:48 am - I really think that is quite late.
  - oarsinsync 8y ago
    I leave every morning at 5.30am. I literally see many others (but clearly a minority of peoples) doing the same. It's much nicer doing that in daylight than in darkness, although it was also nice watching the sun rise during my morning swim a couple of months ago.
  - posterboy 8y ago
    Some people have tonwork outsides? Sun light also helps to wake up. So it's a trade off either way.
- FearNotDaniel 8y ago
  Iceland is not in the EU. And also has no land borders with member states. So it doesn't really matter what they choose to do from a Europe-wide perspective.
  - renholder 8y ago
    Fixed. I didn't realise they had frozen their application.
- madcaptenor 8y ago
  Iceland is already on permanent summer time. Reykjavik is at longitude 22 degrees west, so they're "naturally" in GMT-1 (and close to the line with GMT-2) but they use GMT year-round. (The country as a whole is between 13 degrees west and 25 degrees west.)
- qalmakka 8y ago
  I think countries on a blatantly wrong timezone such as Spain should take this opportunity to fix it. For instance, Spain could stay in UTC+1 all year round and go back in the same timezone as Portugal (which is going to certainly pick its summer time as its whole-year round timezone), thus eliminating the artificial shift everything has there (people eat lunch at 14 and dinner at 22, but these times match roughly with 13 and 21 in solar time).
  - mcjiggerlog 8y ago
    What exactly makes it "wrong"? I live in Spain and am perfectly happy with our current timezone and daylight saving. Staying on Winter time just means we get an hour of useless light long before anybody has woken up and take it away from the evening where it is far more appreciated. The spanish public have already been shown to be massively in favor of staying on UTC+2 year-round, though this would mean that the sun wouldn't rise till 0930 in the depths of Winter. I think once the government actually stops and takes a look at the repercussions of all options we will end up carrying on with the status quo.
  - wongarsu 8y ago
    I would argue Portugal is the one in the "wrong" timezone here. If you want the sun to be at its high point at noon, Spain is obviously in the wrong time zone. But you see plenty of countries around the world choosing a slightly different timezone to facilitate trade and communication with some other country (or within itself, in the case of larger countries). With most other barriers to trade gone within the eurozone having to convert timezones is a significant inconvinience that (in the mind of many) outweighs having the sun in slightly the wrong place.
    - allannienhuis 8y ago
      Why would you want the sun to be at it's high point at noon? Perhaps that has value in an agricultural society, but in today's world I'd much rather have more daylight in my leisure hours (evening) than my working hours.
      - 8y ago
- qwsxyh 8y ago
  Here in the UK permenant summer time would mean sunrise would be 9am during the depths of winter. That sounds like a great way to make more accidents (as everyone is now driving to work in the dark at 8am) and also make the seasonal depression worse.
  - bunderbunder 8y ago
    Southern Britain gets just over 8 hours of sunlight in the middle of winter. Meaning you can choose between people driving to work with the sun up, or driving home from work with the sun up, but you can't have both. So I guess we'll just have to decide whether people would rather get hit by cars just after breakfast or just before dinner.
    - qwsxyh 8y ago
      Permenant winter time means that school hours in Winter are entirely contained within sunlight hours. Permenant summer time means that kids are walking to school in the dark. I'd rather not have them hit by drivers also driving in the dark.
      - deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
      - cr1895 8y ago
        >kids are walking to school in the dark. As they already do in many other places. Why should this be particularly dangerous for the UK compared to elsewhere?
      - wongarsu 8y ago
        The potential effects on mood and freetime activities of having all sunlight hours fall into school hours sound more serious than walking to school in the dark (most places where you walk are already illuminated quite well)
      - nicoburns 8y ago
        I'd much rather school kids had time to play in the light after school.
Asooka 8y ago
I'm only aware of Russia switching to permanent summer time in recent memory and they switched back to permanent winter time two years later because the long dark winter mornings were unbearable. Also, your circadian rhythm doesn't care for where the hand on the clock is and doesn't like being pushed too far outside of where you naturally would have it. It would be best to keep the clock as close to astronomical time as the timezone system allows and adjust certain business times if required to be off the standard 9-to-5. Which already happens.

setr 8y ago

>The proposal would give each member state a choice from 2021: either to keep the current summer time system or scrap the twice-yearly clock changes So if you travelled vertically within a timezone, you could end up going back and forth by an hour repeatedly, depending on the state’s decision made here? Truly, a design made by committee.

wongarsu 8y ago
Outside the EU that's already true, even between countries that all observe DST (since start and end times of DST vary). But having most of the EU in the same time zone with the same DST rules was very convinient.
seszett 8y ago
That's already what happens if you go from France to the UK or Spain to Portugal, so it's not really something new.
- FearNotDaniel 8y ago
  UK/France isn't such an issue, there's a big stretch of water in between that takes a minimum of an hour to get across by any mode of transport (once you factor in waiting/boarding time). Not sure how many people make daily border crossings between Spain/Portugal like those I described in my other comment, but even then it is something new if the time difference between states varies with the time of year. In short, if your country opts out of summer time but your close neighbours don't, all those living in densely populated border areas are still affected by the summer time changes, only with the added complexity that your neighbours in the next suburb don't always keep the same time that you do...
renholder 8y ago
>So if you travelled vertically within a timezone, you could end up going back and forth by an hour repeatedly, depending on the state’s decision made here? See: Arizona
- 8y ago

avar 8y ago

> There were 4.6 million replies [to the online] consultation, 70% of which were from Germans. Germans make up around 15% of the EU population. So by this metric they've got an out-sized democratic participation in the EU by a factor of almost 5x. As seen on a solar map [1][2] Germany isn't even particularly badly impacted by this issue compared to say France or Spain. There's some truth to the saying that Germany basically runs the EU, but as results like this show mostly because they seem to be making an effort to give a crap about it and its policies. 1. http://blog.poormansmath.net/images/SolarTimeVsStandardTimeV2.png http://blog.poormansmath.net/images/SolarTimeVsStandardTimeV... (source: http://blog.poormansmath.net/how-much-is-time-wrong-around-the-world/ http://blog.poormansmath.net/how-much-is-time-wrong-around-t...)

seszett 8y ago
There were other consultations though. In the French poll, 2 million answers were given and 84% were also in favor of ending time savings, 60% wanted to keep summer time rather than winter time. For some reason, people often take France and Spain as examples of countries that would be badly impacted by a decision "taken by the Germans", but France and Spain are very much in favor of staying on summer time. I don't know if the BBC is trying to push the idea that the decision is somehow undemocratic, but most countries in the EU have had consultations and as far as I know the results were in favor of giving up time savings everywhere.
- avar 8y ago
  What survey are you referring to? I mean the one the EU did: http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-5302_en.htm http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-5302_en.htm Either you're mis-recalling that "2 million" number for France, or very coincidentally there was some poll specific to France whose result in France was exactly the same (84%) as the one the Commission conducted across the EU. In any case, whether citizens in specific EU countries participate in polls held locally or held by member states isn't relevant if we're discussing how much citizens in various countries directly engage with EU institutions.
  - 8y ago

johannes1234321 8y ago

Mind that this is just a step in the legislative process not the final thing. Next step is the EU Council where relevant ministers of the individual member states have to find an agreement. Some governments aren't that enthusiastic ..

dpark 8y ago
Do all of them actually have to agree or just some majority?
- johannes1234321 8y ago
  This is always so complicated and I do not know. Sometimes they need a simple majority representing so and so many citizens and so and so many different countries (i.e. so that big countries [De+Fr+UK] can't overrule small ones and the small ones can't overrule big ones) some hings have to be unanimous, sometimes a simple majority is enough ...

FearNotDaniel 8y ago

I don't have a strong opinion on whether we're better off with or without the seasonal time change. But I don't like the idea of individual member states opting in or out, which is what this ruling allows. I've lived the past few years in a border town where many people will live in Germany and commute to Austria, or live in Austria but do their regular shopping in Germany, or regularly go on weekend mountain hikes that may cross the border multiple times. Hopefully the authorities are smart enough to avoid the kind of situation where the two regions would end up in different time zones for half the year and all the ensuing confusion over bus and train times, opening hours and so on.

chapium 8y ago
Think about what time change does to hospitals and other critical services. Many systems, but not all are based on UTC and at some point the information needs to be interfaced to a human with the expectation of clocks being a certain way.
Dumbdo 8y ago
I think you misunderstood that bit, see this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19491551 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19491551
- FearNotDaniel 8y ago
  Well yes, I believed the BBC reporter's description of the proposal instead of bothering to read the source document. That's thankfully a bit less ludicrous than what the article suggested.
taejo 8y ago
> two regions would end up in different time zones for half the year AIUI, every pair of countries will (like now) either always be in the same time zone or always be in different ones. Daylight Savings Time is being abolished; the choice is whether the permanent time zone will be the current summer one or the current winter one. Germany and Austria, being closely connected and at simular longitudes will probably choose the same one. Currently Germany shares a timezone with all of it's neighbours. Most Germans seem to think they would prefer UTC+2; there would probably be no reason in that case for Germany's eastern neighbours (including Austria) to go to UTC+1. It's Germany's western neighbours that might end up on a different timezone. Certainly permanent UTC+2 seems crazy for Spain (which is geographically in the UTC zone); France and the Benelux countries are more of a toss-up.

sergioisidoro 8y ago

The news is not correct. Member states cannot chose to keep the daylight savings, but they will have to choose between keeping the summer time or winter time. This is to ensure uniform time keeping in the union to reduce trade costs. quote: "Consequently, the Commission proposes to discontinue the seasonal time changes in the Union, while ensuring that Member States retain the competence to decide on their standard time, in particular whether they will move to the standard time corresponding to their summer-time on a permanent basis or whether they will apply their current standard time permanently. " https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:52018PC0639&from=EN https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELE...

demircancelebi 8y ago

Turkey removed DST in 2017 after 47 years, and it did not cause much trouble.

Asooka 8y ago
And Turkey is on winter time, not summer time. Istanbul is technically closer to being on its local summer time equivalent, but most of Turkey is practically on winter time. It seems the muslim world is again leading in its scientific understanding compared to the backwards west.
- i6tjvo 8y ago
  Yes, it must be that.
- dang 8y ago
  If you troll HN like that again we will ban you.

seba_dos1 8y ago

RIP 0h Game Jam [*] http://0hgame.eu/ http://0hgame.eu/

shanehoban 8y ago
What the..

seanalltogether 8y ago

People often say they would rather have permanent summer time, but from observation it seems everyone sets their rhythm around solar noon regardless, so why not make noon = noon. During the summer months Spain's solar noon is between 2 and 2:30pm. Guess what time Spaniards sit down to eat lunch? In the summer the UKs solar noon is around 1pm, guess what time all the office workers pour out on the streets to eat lunch.

otabdeveloper1 8y ago
Because in the northern latitudes there is no such thing as 'noon'.
- delinka 8y ago
  There is indeed a highest point the sun reaches during the day. It's known as "solar noon."
- rfergie 8y ago
  I don't understand? Are you talking about days in winter where the sun doesn't rise at all?
  - otabdeveloper1 8y ago
    No, I'm talking about the fact that "noon" has no cultural or practical significance if the solar day changes wildly during the year.
- ceejayoz 8y ago
  There's something like a million people in the entire world subject to that edge case. 0.014% of the world doesn't have a solar noon for at least one day a year. I'd say that's not enough to avoid fixing timezones for the other 99.99%.
aequitas 8y ago
Summertime sounds better than wintertime because of the association with summer. Give people the choice between UTC+1 or UTC+2 and you will get wildly different answers.

mabbo 8y ago

> The European Parliament has backed a proposal to stop the obligatory one-hour clock change which extends daylight hours in summer EU-wide. > which extends daylight hours No, it doesn't. The number of daylight hours is exactly the same no matter what your clocks do. All DST does is force everyone to change their schedules so that they wake up earlier, go to work earlier, come home earlier, and go to bed earlier. It effectively forces businesses to open an hour earlier and close an hour earlier because of society's expectations. When you describe it this way, the entire process sounds like something that takes place in a totalitarian state run by a crazy person. Yet here we are as a group claiming it somehow helps farmers (it doesn't, it makes things more challenging for them). The only people who truly benefit from DST are golfers (and golf course owners) who can leave work an hour early and get in a few more rounds.

dezzeus 8y ago
> When you describe it this way Which is by far one of the most accurate description in this community. > the entire process sounds like something that takes place in a totalitarian state run by a crazy person It's due to the way the Universe works, it only requires a review of your early school notes about science / geography / astronomy. DST is a way to compensate that "strange" behavior for the current definition of a "time-zone". Is DST good ? it depends because we over-generalize the definition of a "time-zone" by taking in consideration only the longitude, but not the latitude. (and above/below certain latitudes, nothing can be done) Is DST good for EU (or North America) ? Mostly yes if you take a closer look at the year-round daylight charts for key geographic coordinates. Extra notes while here: 1) "EU propose to get rid of DST", its our best interest to keep it; don't let some incompetent rule such a thing because he/she doesn't really know how it works but only how it's perceived. 2) "If I have to choose, I prefer more daylight in the evening": fine, but that is out of scope from DST; it's about changing schedules. Clock should (I'd say "must") stay on their natural "time-zone" for the sake of coordination and travel.

nikanj 8y ago

Conveniently this is going to steal a lot of press from the copyright reform

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

tilolebo 8y ago

I have been wondering for a while: will this decision trigger any significant work to make software compatible? Or is it "just" a timezone library to update and voila?

notatoad 8y ago
it's just a tz library to update, assuming you're using a tz library. Any poorly localized software is going to have issues. The challenge is actually getting that update pushed out to everything that needs it. Every embedded and IoT device needs to get a new tz database, and any applications that might use a different tz database to the system one need to be updated. It's not significant programming work necessarily, but it's still probably going to cause a significant number of bugs in reality.

ridgewell 8y ago

I recognize that this is probably an unpopular opinion but I live for the days when the sun sets at 9pm. DST really factors in quite well for night owls like myself. I'm aware there is a strong degree of detraction in terms of complicating time keeping and body clock adjustments. It makes the daylight stretch into what we conventionally consider the night. In the winter, I'm always somewhat a little sad that the sun sets before I even leave the office (~4-4:30pm), but I'm always in a much better mood in the summer when I leave the office at 5pm and still have hours of daylight left in the day.

dsfyu404ed 8y ago
The late evening sunset in the summer is a godsend for anyone who has a day job and has projects they need to work on outdoors. It's like having every weekday followed by a Saturday afternoon for productivity purposes.
pmontra 8y ago
I'm not particularly a night owls but sunset at 9 PM or 10 PM in June is much better than wasting sunlight when people are sleeping at 5 or 6 AM (which is my country is pretty much all of us.) I'll vote for permanent summer time if we'll have to make a choice by holding a referendum.

1337biz 8y ago

Not bad, they now at least understand the basics of PR! Always combine an unpopular decision (uploadfilter) with a popular one (summer time).

wazoox 8y ago

People vote for "summer time" because they, d'oh, prefer summer. But summer time in winter is atrocious. And there are many people getting up early, they're (mostly) called "the poor", those generally brown people who clean up your office hours before you come in, prepare food early so that you can eat at noon, collect trash, etc. I know, they don't vote and don't really count, who cares if they can't see the daylight all winter long? Yeah, that's a cynical take on the class orientation of HN... (I don't get up at 5 and never ever reach the office before 10:30 myself).

jedberg 8y ago
I don't think you're right that it's mostly poor people who get up early, but even if it is, they would benefit even more from permanent summer time. There would still be sunlight after they get off work, and if they started their shift at 5am, then they get a whole lot of sunlight after work, an hour more than they would otherwise.

tzs 8y ago

It's really a simple question. How should you approximate this curve? ....................*****..... .................***.....**... ................*..........**. *.............**.............* .**..........*................ ...**.....***................. .....*****.................... If you think it should be this, you want permanent standard time: .............................. .............................. .............................. ****************************** .............................. .............................. .............................. If you think it should be this, you want permanent summer time: .............................. .............................. ****************************** .............................. .............................. .............................. .............................. If you think it should be something like this, you want some kind of DST system: .............................. .............................. ****..........**************** .............................. ....*********................. .............................. ..............................

sixothree 8y ago
There are two curves to account - sunrise and sunset. Daylight savings attempts to flatten one of those and not the other!
- dezzeus 8y ago
  Yes, because DST correctly attempt to adjusts Sunrise towards our usual wake-up time (obviously it can't do miracles).

bbojan 8y ago

I hated DST, but now that I have kids I really like it - it means in the summer I have one more hour of sunlight to play with them outside after I come back from work.

throwaway123001 8y ago

The consultations might have had a different result if there had been a practical multiple-choice test with questions that link the idea of DST to actual consequences. Like: Would you like to go to work in the light or in the dark during winter time? Would you like to have some daylight while having barbecue at 9pm in the summer. ... (My concern is that people had no idea of the practical consequences beside sucks-to-have-to-get-up-one-hour-earlier and will be in for a rude awakening)

acqq 8y ago
Exactly. Basing the policy of the whole Union on the internet votes is... just wrong.
nybble41 8y ago
Whether you go to work in the light or in the dark is determined by your work schedule relative to the local solar day/night cycle. Not DST. If you want to drive to work in daylight, negotiate for your working hours to start after sunrise. If you'd prefer some sunlight after work ends, negotiate for your working hours to end before sunset. Keep in mind that you won't get both year-round at most latitudes simply because a typical work day is longer than the length of visible daylight in winter. (What would probably make the most sense would be 10-12 hour work days in the summer and 4-6 hour work days in the winter, centered around solar noon, but that's likely to face strong opposition from both sides.) The only _practical_ consequences of DST vs non-DST lie in whether we try to force everyone to shift their schedules all at once twice a year or leave it to individuals and businesses to set their schedules as they see fit. There are no practical consequences for permanent-standard-time vs. permanent-summer-time. Either way, people will adjust their schedules to suit local conditions just as they do now, but without the complication of abrupt time changes in the spring and fall. My preference would be to place local noon as close as possible to solar noon (+/- 45 minutes, to permit one-hour time zone offsets without splitting up dense urban areas) so that morning and afternoon are approximately the same length, but I wouldn't call that a _practical_ difference, as long as the offset from solar noon is consistent. It's more a matter of aesthetics, in particular a distaste for needless complexity.
- 8y ago

JohannesH 8y ago

Made this little visualization of the night/dawn/sunrise/day/sunset/dusk/night times throughout the year. https://codepen.io/JohannesEH/full/JzVgeR https://codepen.io/JohannesEH/full/JzVgeR