On Sunday 5 November, most Americans will awake having “gained” an extra hour of sleep as daylight savings time comes to an end.
At 2am, the clocks will “fall back” to standard time until March when daylight savings begins again.
That is, except for those living in Arizona or Hawaii.
For the last 55 years, the two states have remained on standard time while the other 48 states change their clocks bi-annually.
That is because Arizona and Hawaii rejected to implement daylight savings time once the federal government tried to make it permanent across the country – and they have good reason for it.
The unpopular time change was first introduced in the US in 1918 as a way to conserve energy during World War I. The thought was that by extending evening daylight hours in the winter, people would use less energy, per the US Department of Transportation.
But in 1966, Congress passed the Uniform Time Act to establish consistency among the states by making daylight savings time a standard use from March until November.
But two states chose to be outliers by passing their own legislation to bypass the implementation.
Arizona rejected daylight savings time in 1968 because state officials felt it would be counterproductive to extend summer daylight hours into the scorching afternoon when the already hot climate is at its hottest, according to the Pima County Library.
They argued that residents would utilise more energy to keep their homes cool in the late afternoon thus making daylight savings time moot.
However, the exception to Arizona’s time zone rule is the Navajo Nation which follows daylight savings time because it extends across Arizona, New Mexico and Utah.
Meanwhile, Hawaii opted out of the Uniform Time Act in 1967 because daylight savings time would make little to no difference for the state.
Due to Hawaii’s close proximity to the equator, the sun rises and sets around the same time every day, according to Hawaii News Now. So adding an hour of daytime in the summer would be useless.
Several other US territories do not observe daylight savings time including Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, American Samoa and Guam.
Over the last few years, several US states have toyed with the idea of getting rid of daylight savings time due to its negative impact on sleep and small impact on energy conservation.
