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The Weekly DiScussion: How green is your festival?
Looking forward to festivals this year? Killers. No, not the ubiquitous straggly quartet from Las Vegas, you. You who, step-by-step, are destroying the environment and our beautiful planet with your discarded beer cups, burning up, well, everything, and probably hiring an 18-wheeler to transport you and your mates there.
Yes, festivals are bad for the planet. Have you looked over the rubbish-strewn fields the day after the craziness has ended? Unpleasant stuff.
And, given that 2007 is the year of ecological awareness, we should probably be doing something about our Carbon Footprint. Um, what the hell is a Carbon Footprint?
Firstly, the Carbon referred to is Carbon Dioxide (CO2): a greenhouse gas which is one of the major causes of global warming and climate change.
A Carbon Footprint is made up of the sum of two parts, the direct / primary footprint and the indirect / secondary footprint. Explained…
1. The primary footprint is a measure of our direct emissions of CO2 from the burning of fossil fuels including domestic energy consumption and transportation (e.g. car and plane).
2. The secondary footprint is a measure of the indirect CO2 emissions from the whole lifecycle of products we use - those associated with their manufacture and eventual breakdown.
Right, science class over. Who are the big players, and what are they doing about our endangered environment?
Weekend rock behemoths Mean Fiddler’s Reading/Leeds festival make a fairly token effort on their website, saying that: “The Carling Weekend: Reading And Leeds Festivals is committed to causing minimal environmental impact". Right. So what do you recommend, Reading/Leeds? "Travelling by coach allows you to take the most ecological option whilst also starting the weekend early with like minds on the trip to the site and ending the weekend later with all your new friends on the return journey.”
Hmmm. Given that about a quarter of the bands and crew are flying halfway across the globe, that ain’t much, matey.
In the capital, the 02 Wireless Festival offers a tad more guff on their website.
“The 02 Wireless Festival in London takes place in one of the capital’s most beautiful green spaces, and this year we are committed to making the festival greener both by reducing our carbon emissions across the whole festival organisation and by providing you with ways to reduce your own carbon footprint.
“Please stay green; use the recycling bins provided for cans and plastics, use the litter bins for other waste. There’s a 20p deposit on cups at the bars, to encourage you to hand your old cup in for recycling. Look out for other ways you can reduce your carbon footprint on-site at the festival.
“Remember to use public transport to get to the festival, and give yourself at pat on the back for helping us to reduce the festival's carbon footprint.”
Slightly better.
The best of the lot in terms of the super-size events is, of course, Glastonbury. Their site is a veritable bonanza of eco-awareness, with links to all manner of energy saving camping devices, links to good causes, and handy hints and tips for your average festival goer. Plus, the Glasto’ site will be patrolled by ‘Green Police’, helpfully pointing out the dolts who piss in bushes (bad for the streams) and drop their burger wrappers on the ground.
Good work, Team Eavis.
Of course, various other events around the world manage to offset their rock ‘n’ roll chicanery with a tree-hugging awareness that is only fitting in this day and age.
The Sasquatch Festival in Washington, US (headlined by Arcade Fire, Beasties and Björk) has proudly announced that it is certified carbon neutral by Sustainable Energy Partners this year. And there are many more.
Of course, DiS’s green-awareness festival of choice this year is the magnificent Hove Festivalen in Tromoy, Norway. At the five-day event this summer (June 25-29), all food, eating utensils and drinking vessels will be composted and become garden mould. There will be a deposit on the drinking cups, and these will also be recycled to new products. The paper is recycled. All of the Hovefestival promotional material is printed on recycled paper.
The organisers had this to say:
“The main objective is to minimise the impacts from the Hove Festival activities on nature and environment, and support, facilitate/contribute and encourage a sustainable development. The sub goal is to give all employees/volunteers in the Hove Festival ownership to the environment sustainability profile, and to establish an environment and sustainability accountancy for the Hove Festival including indicators for reporting/monitoring and improving. We also want to encourage the audience of the Hove Festival to take environmental and sustainability responsibility – even after the festival – with concrete, good and simple information on "how" and "why". We have a great responsibility in this unique opportunity to communicate and promote these extremely important issues, and in showing how environmentally friendly and sustainable a music festival can be.”
Sweeeet. Find out more about Hove here, and check out the latest line-up here.
DiScuss: Are you going to be more environmentally aware this year? What can you as a punter and the bands and organisers do to make festivals carbon neutral? Which events are the best advocates for cleaner, greener festivals?
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zzz
Am I the only one who is growing increasingly tired of being told to be "green" by everyone ever? It's not like I'm going around deliberately polluting the world. If I'm going to cut back on using carbon dioxide or whatever the fuck it is this week, I expect the same from industry, and America, and airlines and stuff.
Good article though.
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Hove
I got my ticket the other day. I'm actually looking forward to going to a festival that has such an environmental angle on things. It's be a shame to see such a nice area turn into a dump on the scale on Leeds or Reading.
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wireless's 20p for the cup
sounds like a good idea to me - I've worked at a few of the festival bars inc. reading & glasto and the sheer quantity of laminate coated cups you get through is astonishing. Would be much more effective than Eavis's green gestapo I think. Probably a nightmare to organise though.
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^^ You're not alone there
...but households and individuals make up a considerable precentage of CO2 emissions in the UK. There IS an increasingly powerful green lobby in the States and industry will follow because they have to, but individuals' attitudes need to change too.
You're quite right to say "carbon dioxide or whatever the fuck it is this week"; whilst I don't wish to belittle the issue, CO2 is just one of many impacts worth considering and it's an unfortunate truth that it happens to be the big 'cause' in 2007.
My hat goes off to festivals like Truck and Two Thousand Trees who, whilst unlikely to be carbon neutral (which the bigger festivals will have achieved through the dubious practice of offsetting), have a proportionally smaller environmental impact than the more established shindigs.
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what if we all become so
ecofriendly that one of these crackpot schemes actually works, causing the planet to cool too much? will we then have to intentionally create extra pollution to balance things out and make the planet warmer again? how will we know when the planet's correct temperature is reached?
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How about this?
The amount of damage we do to our bodies during a festival easily our carbon foot-whatsit-wank as they almost certainly reduce each of our lifespans.
Seriously, though, FUCK OFF. A festival is one of the very few times a year you get to kick back and just not worry about anything beyond what you're going to do about a clash between two bands you really want to see. Oh, and when you should start queueing for the toilet. And whether the drugs are working. And was I that much of a twat when I was 18? I hope my tent's OK. Didn't like the look of those people loitering around. God, I pray I can get this cask of wine past security...
Actually, there's a fair few things to worry about at festivals. Either way, we can do without the environmental guilt-trip for a couple of days a year.
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I'm sorry
but no pissing in bushes?
Thats fucking ridiculous, what am i supposed to do? Queue for the toilets?
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amusingly, i am work as an environmental scientist.
and yes, i'm biased, but leicester's summer sundae takes the green award. with local waste management recycling, so all cans, bottles and waste is recycled. sponsorship from friends of the earth and climate change appeals, biodegradeable pint glasses, and tree planting to provide an equilibrium to carbon output.
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Just do it!
Sadly the green 'thing' is there no matter how fed up we get of hearing about it. We're all hopelessly addicted to oil. Most of us can't even begin to see what life would be like without it, never mind volunteering to accept it. If we don't stop polluting, we will all die miserably and soon. Our children, friends and families too.
Set your boredom and your distaste aside; you have no choice. You need to use 90% less energy than you do now. So do I. :-( Let's get to it. I want to live, and I want my friends and family to live too. How about you?
Pattern-chaser
"Who cares, wins"
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It's about time
I think, it's at least a step forward that organizers and bands have a little thought about what a festival means in terms of waste, it's certainly not enough, even if people think it's just a festival, anything helps to raise a bit more awareness of what we'are doing to our beloved planet, and screaming and pointing the finger at the big players (like industry) is just childish, we as consumer have to change and we have the power to change the big ones, and a festival is a good place to start with, so well done for sparing a thought on the environment
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BIG GREEN GATHERING
the BIG GREEN GATHERING!
this is the most green festival surely...it's entirely powered by renewable energy sources. went there last year, was an amazing week - incredibly magical and special place. check it out!
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what?!
Jesus christ, you really are a total, total dickhead. How about a bit of long-term thinking instead of your narrow minded bullshit... ok, so you might shorten your lifespan by taking shitloads of pills and smoking and drinking - but what about the future for everyone else on the planet...your kids, your grandkids...
twat
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'was I that much of a twat when I was 18?'
sounds like you still are.
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'it's not like i'm going around deliberately polluting the world'
no, it's nobody's fault, it's just 'the way things are'.
this country needs to grow some fucking balls.
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this is getting ridiculous
yes we could all cut down, in fact i have, but not ironing owt (Y) but responsiblity really lies with our government.
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I SECOND THAT
god forbid david fucking cameron coming round my house to check my paper, glass, plastics and cans. you can try and blame the government for everything, but it's probably the dumbest thing you can do. something as massive as this can only be solved by a LOT of individuals acting the same way.
how much affect has cameron had on you to recycle moodiejg? sheesh.
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02 wireless cup deposit
surely this means youl be able to pick loads up from the floor and make yourself a fortune
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At Roskilde
they have this, and there are entire families of really small people who make lots of money picking them up and doing nothing else.
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