Daylight Saving Time In The United States And Canada Ends Sunday Morning

Most North Americans and most Canadians will be turning their clocks back an hour on Sunday to mark the end of daylight saving time. At least for this year the British Columbians will be among them.

But there’s a growing push to abandon seasonal time changes and stick to one time zone year-round. This week, British Columbia tabled legislation that would allow the province to move permanently to daylight time.

"Because we are monitoring similar initiatives with our neighbors in Yukon, Washington, Oregon and California, the change in the bill would not take effect immediately, but would be brought into force later to create the opportunity for a coordinated approach with these other jurisdictions," Eby declared.

While those efforts faltered, the B.C. government is tabling legislation that would see it move ahead with the plan at an undetermined time.

According to Canada's National Research Council, the sun will rise that day Dec. 21 at 8:05 a.m. and it will set at 4:16 p.m. Under permanent daylight time, the sun would rise at 9:05 a.m. and set at 5:16 p.m. While the prospect of leaving the office before the sun goes down may be appealing to some nine-to-five workers, the researchers say it has negative consequences for many people's body clocks.

The biggest snag in all this is the U.S. Congress, which can't seem to find the time to deal with requests from states for permission to go to year-round daylight saving time. Congress needs to get involved because while states can adopt year-round standard time, the federal Uniform Time Act does not currently allow for year-round daylight saving time.

Werner Antweiler, a University of British Columbia economics professor, said that co-ordination is a somewhat cumbersome process that may take some time to unfold. However, he said, a growing body of research suggests jumping through the bureaucratic hoops may be worth the effort.

On Monday, Congressman Derek Kilmer (D-Wash.) added his name as a co-sponsor of a House bill that would simply give states the option to observe daylight saving time year-round. It's anybody's guess when or if Congress will get with the times.

No changes will go into effect before the next round of seasonal time changes. Clocks are due to move back one hour in most parts of the country on Sunday morning.