Festivals are getting greener and greener and that’s good news. Gathering more than 80,000 people in the same place in the space of 3 days is not without impact on the environment. The sources of pollution are numerous between the equipment, the lighting, the movements of the artists and the public or the by-products and the waste generated.
According to studies, a festival of 50,000 spectators in France would represent nearly 1,000 tonnes of CO2, or the equivalent of 400 Paris/New York round trips. A festival like the Vieilles Charrues which brings together 280,000 people over four days each year potentially represents 14,000 tonnes of CO2 equivalent. It’s “nothing” compared to Coachella which attracts 125,000 spectators and 107 tons of waste every day and leads to more than a million greenhouse gases over the entire event.
The main problem is transportation. The movement of festival-goers, artists and equipment accounts for 80% of the festival’s CO2 emissions.
The food and drinks consumed on site also have an environmental impact (20%) as do waste and cigarette butts, not forgetting of course the electricity consumed during the event.
Solutions exist
To reduce the impact of such an event, it would be necessary to organize smaller events to limit the movements of too many festival-goers and also to better choose the place.
A festival that takes place on land where there is no infrastructure will require all the logistics: stage, electricity, water, drainage, and will therefore be more polluting. In this case generally, there is no public transport nearby which implies many journeys by car.
Artists’ tours must also be thought out in advance to integrate festivals and limit unnecessary travel.
Switching to a local and vegetarian diet could reduce C02 emissions by 15% while opting for energy coming 100% from a green electricity supplier.
2023-05-19 06:23:52
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