Plastic bottle art installation at Eco Lands. Photo courtesy of Outside Lands.
Ah, the large-scale summer music festival. As entertainment it’s unrivaled, although admittedly it’s hard to come to terms with the militant picnic-banning and bizarro economy (the inflated food and drink prices rival those in airports). I, for my part, once woke up at the Pacific Northwest’s Sasquatch Festival to find dried vomit on my jeans—the by-product of an evening spent taking direct pulls out of a flask, my soda mixer having been unceremoniously swiped by a security guard who encouraged me to purchase an overpriced bottle inside. I declined, at my own peril: I had two days of music to go and no other pants to wear.
Upon closer inspection, however, it appears there is much more good than evil at summer music festivals. Regional events like the sold-out Outside Lands, happening this weekend, emphasize preserving the many gifts Mother Nature gives us for free.
With practical methods in place and a conscious Earth-friendly perspective, the Bay Area’s music festivals aren’t just about showcasing great bands. Festival organizers see an opportunity to educate performers and audiences about green practices—some of which admittedly go down easier than others.
“The solar stage is always sort of the red-headed step child,” acknowledges Outside Lands co-founder and head of sustainable practices Bryan Duquette, who says performers are generally skeptical of an alternatively powered stage’s ability to support a full sound and light system. “Everyone has this understanding that a solar stage is a rinky dink stage,” he says. But the solar stage grows and develops each year and currently can serve shows with up to 7,500 attendees, up from 2,500 in 2008. This year Philadelphia indie rockers Dr. Dog will headline on it Saturday night.
Outside Lands features an environmental education area and demonstration are called Eco Lands, located close to the solar stage. Duquette says many festivals have an environmental area like this, but what makes Eco Lands special is its proximity to the music. This garners it more traffic and makes it more of an integrated part of the whole festival.
Encouraging alternative methods of transportation is another way festivals cut down on CO2 emissions. Ben Challis, co-founder of A Greener Festival, a British nonprofit dedicated to helping festivals improve sustainable practices, says audience travel is the biggest contributor to most events’ carbon footprint. Local festivals have stepped up.
Eliote Durham, Director of Operations for San Francisco’s Hardly Strictly Bluegrass (Oct. 5-7) festival, which welcomes 750,000 attendees, says they provide spaces for more than 10,000 bikes (“Just bike rack after bike rack after bike rack”). Treasure Island (Oct. 13-14), another San Francisco popular music festival with about 12,000 attendees each day, has a zero-emission bus that takes people from the bike parking area to the festival grounds. Outside Lands offers bike parking too, in addition to a shuttle that takes patrons from downtown San Francisco to the festival grounds. The price of a pass for the whole weekend is under $30.
Music festivals are also moving away from the plastic-heavy bottled water scene. Outside Lands and Treasure Island have the same earth-friendly (and money-making) scheme: attendees can either purchase a souvenir water bottle for $15 or so, which can be filled up an infinite number of times for free, or use their own bottle to fill up for $1 each time. The Monterey Jazz Festival (Sept. 21-23), which expects 10,000 attendees this year, offers patrons free water refills with any bottle their hearts desire.
Many festivals also envision a future of zero waste. Outside Lands, Treasure Island and Hardly Strictly Bluegrass all require food vendors to use only compostable plates, cups and cutlery. Last year 87 percent of Hardly Strictly Bluegrass’s waste was diverted from landfills and either composted or recycled. Outside Lands diverted 77 percent.
Having three different bins—trash, recycle and compost—is standard operating procedure at all large-scale San Francisco festivals, as it is required by city ordinance. Whether audiences know what to do with the options, however, is debatable. Outside Lands has around 100 “trash talkers”—volunteers who help patrons sort which bin their waste should go in. And there’s still a need for basic “give a hoot, don’t pollute” evangelizing. Says Hardly Strictly Bluegrass’s Durham, “People tend to throw stuff on the ground still. It’s pretty amazing.”
Challis says music festivals have a unique opportunity to promote sustainable practices: “People tend to be at festivals for substantial periods of time—often days—and do not spend the whole time watching performances.” He says simply setting an example is more effective than “pushing” ideas on audience members.
Duquette says Outside Lands aims to impact audiences both during and after the festival: “If we can do this on a mass scale, then you can easily incorporate some of this ideology into your home life. It’s really simple stuff. Putting the right waste on the right receptacles. Not drinking bottled water. Riding your bike.”
