This August in Nashville, nearly 5,000 people in neon chaps, gothic chains and kaleidoscopic crop tops gathered at Bicentennial Park for the electronic music festival. They rotated to a pulsating set by British DJ Chris Lake and electronic duo Snakehips. They watched a choreographed light show and had massages at a healer’s village.
And as they raised their arms in the air, many of them flashed green wristbands to show their commitment to partying in a carbon-neutral way.
Billed as the “Greenest Festival” in the country, Deep Tropics had no trash cans (although there were plenty of compost bins for recycling) and single-use plastics were prohibited. Festival organizers said all the carbon dioxide (including the fuel used by all festival-goers) consumed over the two-day event would be offset by planting about 23,000 trees.
“We are the next generation festival,” said Blake Achinson, 39, who founded Deep Tropics with his twin brother Joel Achinson in 2017. “We are trying to be on the cutting edge of technology and culture, sustainability and the arts.”
Traditional music festivals consume a lot of resources. Sound systems and lights alone consume a lot of power. Massive festivals like Lollapalooza and Tomorrowland draw hundreds of thousands of revelers. They use their energy to get there and leave a pile of garbage behind. Items that cannot be brought in manually must be brought in by truck.
And That’s Not Counting DJs A 2021 Report by beautiful sceneIt is the climate community of Berlin.
But there are innovative efforts by eco-conscious organizers to make festivals greener, sometimes through small, cozy initiatives like composting toilets and vegan food trucks. Others are trying to have a greater impact by offsetting their carbon footprint or using the body heat of dancers to power heating and cooling systems.
“There’s a lot of pressure at festivals, especially since it’s a big event,” said Fallon MacWilliams, 37, a Berlin DJ and promoter and one of Clean Scene’s three founders. “On this year’s tour, we saw many festivals changing their stance on plastics and encouraging artists to take the train to festivals.”
Vision: 2025It is a non-profit organization located in Bristol, England. daybreakerhosts sober dance parties around the world and hosts a series of morning raves to ban single-use plastic and encourage public transportation.
Some festival organizers say the changes should be more systematic. Music festivals are “totally dependent on fossil fuel consumption because they are so totally dependent on cheap airline tickets,” said Clean Scene founder Eilidh McLaughlin, 35, of his age. increase. “Any effort to promote sustainability is fundamentally greenwashing unless it is actively working to break the cycle and reduce its carbon footprint with more sustainable tours.”
2020, DGTLMoreis an Amsterdam organization that produces electronic music festivals with a commitment to climate neutrality. “We are trying to create a new festival landscape where sustainability is the norm,” says DGTL’s Sustainability Manager Mitchell van Douieveerd, 31. “We are experts in our field and everyone wants change, so this has become our business model.”
At this year’s Deep Tropics, the organizers are green disco, a New York company that helps events go green. During the festival, founders Jonah Geshwind, 22, and Jacob Chandler, 21, stood at the entrance selling $20 “eco bands.” This is a green wristband that funds tree planting and other environmental causes.
“If we make sustainability easy and as cool as possible, people will naturally adopt it,” said Chandler, who sold about 500 bracelets. It is estimated that this offsets 400 tons of carbon dioxide.
Larger festivals are also working on it. Coachella increased vegan food options, encouraged attendees to carpool, and promised to reduce emissions. burning man launched its 10-year sustainability roadmap in 2019.
And I’m also trying some music activities. Coldplay has promised that this tour will emit half as many greenhouse gases as the previous tour.band is on tour kinetic dance floor It uses human motion to generate electricity. This floor was a former attraction of Rotterdam’s dance club Club Watt, which is now closed.
Yet, sometimes practical utility gets in the way. At this year’s Burning Man, he was stuck in a 12-hour traffic jam that left Laver stuck in a hot, idling car as Nevada temperatures surpassed his 100s. Deep Tropics also found some vendors using plastic packaging even though they signed a pledge.
That doesn’t mean there’s no progress, said Heather White, 49, an environmental scientist and nonprofit founder in Bozeman, Montana. one green thing.
“From the level of 30,000 feet, does this all matter?” she said. “It’s absolutely critical. These electronic music festivals are engines of cultural change. We need these living laboratories where people can lean in concerts. Because policy solutions don’t work.”