Editorial
How To Reduce Your Carbon Footprint This Festival Season
With the festival season upon us, how can we ensure that our love of enjoying live music in the great outdoors impacts the environment positively? What can festivalgoers do easily and cheaply to ensure they have a better greener festival experience this summer?
Festivals are all about fun, community and connection, something we all need now more than ever. They have the power to shake us out of old behavioural patterns; shape culture and create sub-cultures; and they can serve as catalysts for positive change.
A Greener Future (AGF) is the creator of the world’s first green festival standards and certification – A Greener Festival. For 20 years, the international not-for-profit has been dedicated to making the live event sector sustainable. AGF understands the positive impact festivals can have and how simple lifestyle changes can significantly reduce our impact on the planet, its wildlife, and each other.
So, if you want to be a conscientious, nature-friendly festivalgoer:
1. How will you travel there?
Support your local scene and community by attending festivals closer to home. By attending events nearer to where you live, or at least in your own country, you can reduce travel emissions whilst nurturing local music culture. With so many festivals taking place, there is likely to be something in your area that can be reached either by public transport or even by bike or on foot. In AGF’s Annual Festival Sustainability Insights report, a third of festivals recorded over 70% local audiences. We’d like to see that increase.
If you do have to drive, use every seat, even if it means kidnapping. Okay, we didn’t really mean that. But give your friends a lift and connect with fellow travellers through the festival’s own channels or check out platforms like Liftshare and GoCarShare. If you’re hiring a car, then go electric.
If you’re travelling further afield, before booking that flight, check out the train and bus options. Train travel around Europe is easy, fast, and oh, reliable. Many festivals organise inter-country coaches to shuttle their audiences in. Sleeper trains are increasingly available across multiple routes throughout Europe, and the Eurostar goes to Paris, Amsterdam, and Brussels from London. AGF’s co-founder has travelled by train from the UK to many parts of Europe, including Berlin, Stockholm, Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Spain, Italy and even Tromsø in the Arctic Circle and it’s a great experience. Plan in advance to get the cheapest rates.
2. What will you eat?
This might come as a surprise, but food and drink are responsible for one of the highest sources of a festival’s emissions.
Festivals who move to a fully meat-free event can substantially reduce their food-related emissions and their wider ecological footprint. The 2024 AGF Annual Festival Sustainability Insights report found a nearly threefold increase in the number of festivals going fully vegetarian or vegan from 2023. Choose plant-based food to significantly reduce emissions and protect and respect nature. Every plant-based meal you choose is good for the environment.
As tempting as it is to take enough food to last a fortnight when you head to a festival, studies have shown that much of the food ends up going to waste, along with all its packaging. Only take non-perishable food that you know you will eat, and if you have any left, take it home or donate it to a foodbank.
3. Re-use & Recycle
The average site recycling rate across all festivals assessed by AGF increased from 38% in 2022 to 49% in 2024, and the average waste per person per day across all festival types was 0.8kg.
There are many simple things you can do to reduce your waste and recycle more. Bringing food, drinks, and camping gear to a festival is a good way to save money, but make sure it doesn’t go to waste. The average festivalgoer generates nearly three times more waste at a camping festival than a non-camping one, often by bringing in too much, or simply leaving their stuff behind.Plan your shopping and take in stuff you can bring back home, otherwise it’s also a waste of money!
If camping, remember that camping equipment is for life – not just for one festival. Campaigns such as Love Your Tent and #takeyourtenthome have done a great job of highlighting the scale of the abandoned camping equipment problem at the end of festivals. If you really can’t take it home, then don’t take it. Book pre-pitched camping and travel light. And if the thought of sleeping in a small tent fills you with abject terror, check out boutique glamping options or buy a second-hand bell tent and share it with non-snoring friends, preferably with good personal hygiene.
And if you want to perfect that festival look, you can swap generic fast fashion for unique second-hand and vintage clobber.
Disposable vapes are bad for the environment and the majority end up as electronic waste in landfill sites or littering the land, so please use refillable ones if vape you must. Many festivals are now banning disposable vapes because they are so bad for the environment and become hazardous once they’re disposed of.
You can also use reusable containers for toiletries and refill them with eco-friendly products rather than carrying large items or buying small plastic disposables.
4. Reduce your use of plastics
Free drinking water is always available at festivals, so take a refillable bottle and save yourself some moolah whilst doing your bit to reduce plastic usage. If you wanna be a real eco-warrior, take reusable cup and cutlery. The 2024 AGF Annual Festival Sustainability Insights highlighted that 70% of festivals had introduced a ban on single-use plastic (including plastic water bottles), so it is best to come prepared with reusables.
When packing toiletries, go eco with products that contain microbeads, cotton buds with cardboard or bamboo sticks, a wooden or bamboo toothbrush, and plastic-free packaging. And you can take a foldaway reusable bag instead of using plastic carrier bags.
Other easy changes you can implement as a festival-lover is using flannels or paper hand towels instead of wet wipes (which aren’t biodegradable), and avoiding plastic glitter. And most importantly, ensure that you connect with your festival family and enjoy the precious time that you have together, dance your pants off to great music, and marvel at the nature that surrounds us.
So, there you have it: travel greener, go as plant-based as possible, take only what you need, take your camping stuff home afterwards, and enjoy life. Sounds relatively easy, no?
Here’s to making this festival season the least environmentally impactful fest season yet!