ORLANDO, Fla.- – We debate this twice a year: Should we move the clock back and forward during the year?
It’s a heated topic that has passionate people on both sides. So, what would our sunset and sunrise look like if we kept daylight saving time all year or we kept standard time all year.
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I know it’s a huge hassle to make the change, but there is a method to the madness. Things would get weird if we didn’t.
If we kept daylight saving time all year:
This Saturday night, we will spring ahead one hour. For the people who like daylight in the evening, this is your time.
The latest sunset in summer, as a result of moving the clock ahead one hour, is 8:27 p.m. If we stayed in DST all year and didn’t fall back in November, the latest sunrise would occur at 8 a.m., meaning we would have complete darkness through 7 a.m. in the deepest part of winter.
Doing what we currently do and “falling back" one hour has the latest winter sunrise at 7:18 a.m. Sunsets in the middle of winter, however would occur after 6 p.m., with the earliest happening at 6:28 p.m., which may help seasonal affective disorder.
If we kept standard time all year:
If we observed standard time all year, a lot of your summer evening activities would fall in darkness. The sun would come up much earlier, the earliest being 5:27 a.m. in the middle of summer, but the latest sunset would only be 7:27 p.m.
The time change, while inconvenient, allows us to save the daylight in the summer months and prohibits an extremely late sunrise in the middle of winter.