LATITUDE FESTIVAL

Latitude Green

At Latitude Festival we aim to reduce the environmental impact of the festival and have put together ways you can help us by doing your part, while still having an awesome festival.

In 2007 we introduced some new ways of looking at recycling which we also repeated with great success last year. This included the £2 deposit and refund on re-usable beer cups. Thanks to everyone who was at the festival and got into that campaign. We are sure you’ll agree that having an arena free of beer cups on the ground is a joy.

We perfected the separation of rubbish thanks to everyone that attended and also thanks to our wonderful Green Messengers. After a couple of practice goes, everyone at the festival was putting the right thing in the right bin. We had virtually no contamination in the bins, which is especially important in the compost bins. We’ll be separating the rubbish into compostables, recyclables and landfill again this year.

A big thanks to everyone who packed up their camping gear and took it back home with them last year. We didn’t have too many tents left standing. The campers waste kits handed out were also diligently returned with the right thing in the right bag. Please keep it up in 2010 and separate your campsite waste into recyclables, compostables and landfill and take back to the Litter Points in the campgrounds.

Latitude Festival is managed in compliance with BS8901.

Read through the various items on the left hand menu bar for more info on what’s in store in 2010.

Eco Travel

REDUCE YOUR CARBON FOOTPRINT

Do you know that the biggest CO2 impact on festivals is simply through the audience travelling to get there? In 2008 18% of people travelled by Bus or Train to get to Latitude Festival. We want to try and increase that even more this year. Our shuttle buses from the train stations are really convenient. Leave your car at home and let the party start the moment you board the train!

Emissions: If you travel alone to the festival by car, you are emitting approximately TEN TIMES the amount of CO2 than if you travelled to the festival by bus and three and a half times as much as if you travelled by train.

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Figures for these calculations were taken From DEFRA July 2007 Report: Passenger Transport Emissions Factors. http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/business/envrp/pdf/passenger-transport.pdf

Car Travel (average sized petrol car)
- 344 gram C02 per mile (1 passenger)
- 172 grams CO2 per passenger mile (2 passengers)
- 86 grams CO2 per passenger mile (4 passengers)

Train Travel (National Rail diesel trains – average passenger numbers per annum)
- 96.32 grams per passenger mile

Coach Travel (40 people per coach)
- 26.97 grams CO2 per passenger mile

SUSTAINABLE TRAVEL
We have put some excellent public transport options to get you to the festival without any fuss and with the minimum environmental impact as possible.

By Bike: Riding your bike to the festival will obviously put out the least amount of CO2 emissions. We have bike racks available onsite. See the Travel page for more details.

By Vehicle: If you want to come by vehicle, travelling by coach to the festival is by far the lowest impact way if you’re looking to reduce your carbon footprint. Train is the next best option in terms of CO2 emissions.

Congestion: Coming to the festival by coach or train will not only reduce total CO2 emissions, it will also help to reduce congestion in the carparks and on the surrounding roads.

Coach Is Best: Coaches are the greenest form of motor transport with each journey generating less than 10% of CO2 of those who travel by car. Not to mention a solution for congestion. For each coach full of people, it’s estimated that this is equivalent to 25 cars off the road.  So relax, let somebody else do the driving and do your bit for the environment.

Liftshare & Win VIP upgrade
Latitude's FestivalBUDi - linking passengers and drivers together to share the travel costs.

If you are seeking a lift or if you have to drive your car because the bus and train just won’t work for you, please try Latitude's FestivalBUDi. If you have spare seats in your car and iIf you’re driving an average sized petrol car, having four people in it will bring your CO2 emissions per person to less than travelling by train! So it really does make a difference if fill up all the seats. 

Plus when you arrive in a car filled with people you have been matched to on Latitude's FestivalBUDi you get the chance to enter our lucky draw (for journeys matched no later than 9am Friday 9th July 2010)  for a free upgrade to VIP camping allowing you and all of the occupants of your car free access to VIP camping, the VIP bar and cafe, showers and toilets. Once you have matched journeys, you will be sent a form nearer the time to fill in to enter the draw and hand in at Latitude.

Follow these 4 easy steps:
1. Click on the FestivalBUDi logo below to register, enter a journey & activate your account
2. Search for matches and select those you wish to contact
3. Contact and await reply to arrange
4. Once you have received a reply go to 'My Contacts' within your FestivalBUDi account and click on 'Yes or 'No' to confirm whether you are sharing the journey.



Please visit the Travel Page on the left hand menu to find all the info you need on how to get to the festival by public transport.

Recycling & Composting

Compost It at Latitude

FOOD SCRAPS, PLATES, BOWLS, COFFEE CUPS, CLEAR CUPS, CUTLERY, NAPKINS, PIZZA BOXES, CHIP CARTONS

When you buy food from the traders at Latitude Festival, everything your food comes in is biodegradable. You will notice many traders have plates, bowls and trays from BioPak products made from waste material from the sugarcane industry. If it wasn’t used to make plates, this waste product would otherwise be land-filled or incinerated.

Using plastic or polystyrene packaging is not sustainable – they’re not only oil based but polystyrene can’t be efficiently recycled, and plastic containers that aren’t washed out can’t be recycled either. So we’re going with sustainable packaging that’s also compostable. 
Please make sure NO PLASTIC goes into the compost bins as otherwise the whole load may be rejected.

Recycle It.
PLASTIC BOTTLES, ALUMINIUM CANS, NEWSPAPERS, MAGAZINES, CARDBOARD.

Landfill It.
CRISP PACKETS, COFFEE CUP LIDS, STRAWS, PLASTIC SHOPPING BAGS


Overall Waste Strategies.

Our goal is to minimise the amount of waste going to landfill and to maximize recycling and composting. We do this by:

• Separating recyclables and compostables from general waste which will go to landfill.
• Composting biodegradables. All food packaging, including plates, bowls, cups, containers and cutlery are biodegradable.
• Staffed Litter Points are in the campgrounds to help festival goers with recycling and composting separation.
• Wandering staff onsite pick up recyclable waste.
• Camper’s Waste Kits will be supplied so you can separate your waste at your tent during the festival and then bring it to the campsite Litter Points.
• Green Messengers will be at the bins in the arena to assist in waste separation.
• Resource recovery to salvage reusable items, both in the campgrounds and back of house in the production areas.
• A waste audit will be carried out to measure volumes recycled, composted and going to landfill.


Compostable waste at 2008’s Latitude Festival was turned into this compost within a week!

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Camper's Waste Kits

When you arrive onsite, you will be given your Camper’s Waste Kit. These kits consist of:

- Clear Plastic Bag - for recycling.
Put plastic bottles, aluminium cans, food tins, general plastic containers, newspapers, magazines, flyers & brochures, cardboard and beer cases.

- Biodegradable Bag – for compostables.
Put your food scraps and leftovers, takeaway food packaging, coffee cups, etc.

- For general rubbish – use your shopping bags.
In these go crisp packets, scrappy bits of plastic, straws, coffee cup lids and all other rubbish. Try and minimise this as everything in these bags goes to landfill.

When you’ve filled up your bags, bring them to the Recycling Points in the campgrounds and hand them in. You’ll be met there by the lovely green messengers.

Pint Cup Deposit

Buying Stuff

Limiting the amount of STUFF you kit yourself out with the come the festival really help reduce the overall environmental impact of the festival...especially if you are going to throw out your STUFF after the event.

Before you buy anything for the festival (or even in everyday life), please take the time to watch this 20min film The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard.

www.storyofstuff.com

'From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20 minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns.' 


MARKET TRADERS
All market traders adhere to strict packaging, recycling and composting protocols for the festival. These include:

• All food stalls must use fully compostable food packaging.
• Composting and recyclable waste generated by stalls is placed in appropriate bins
• Plastic bags discouraged.
• Cardboard collection service.
• We encourage stall holders to use of chemical free cleaning products.
• We encourage stall holders to use fair trade and organic products.

Green Camp

Handy Tips for Green Campers

The following are tips for you include:

• Minimise the amount of packaging on products purchased
• Avoid buying over-packaged goods and individual portion packs
• Buy durable products, returnable bottles and containers that can be re-filled
• Look out for recycled goods and those packaged in recycled materials
• Cut down on packaging by buying your fruit and vegetables loose
• Buy fair-trade and organic food, drinks and products at stalls if possible
• Use re-sealable containers to keep your food fresh (this reduces the amount of plastic film and aluminium foil you throw away)
• Use rechargeable batteries
• Where you can, recycle what you cannot reuse
• Don't drop your litter. Use the bins and recycling units!
• Litter pickers are lovely! Please help them and make up for 'messy' times
• Don't leave rubbish or indeed your entire camping set behind!
• Say no to plastic bags if offered by market vendors. Bring your own re-useable cloth bag. Or use the shopping bags as rubbish bags.
• Please please please don’t drop your cigarette butts. Every butt you throw on the ground has to be picked up by someone else. Use an empty film canister to collect your butts.
• Separate your waste at your campsite and bring your recycling to the appropriate bins.
• Use public transport and our shuttle bus service if possible, or look for a lift through the Car Share Schemes.
• If you must use your car, then please consider a Lift Share scheme. Making sure your tyres are properly inflated will mean that your car will run more efficiently and will reduce your carbon emissions. If you are in a queue to enter the site, please turn off your engine rather than idling the car.
• Use only phosphate free shampoo and soap in the showers and remember to take a short shower!
• Turn off taps & showers when finished.
• Live by the 'LEAVE NO TRACE' philosophy – take only photos, leave only footprints.

The Green Tent Company

Click here for more information and to buy a tent

Green Republic

Festival Republic

Festival Republic aims to do as much as possible to reduce the impact our business and our festivals have on the environment. We strive to use innovative solutions to fundamental areas of impact such as energy, waste and transport. We also delve deeper into specific areas of our events, looking for ways to minimise impact, often including festival audiences in helping make these changes happen.

Apart from the immediate benefit in ‘going green’ we hope Festival Republic’s focus on sustainable practices will impact the industry through our suppliers and contractors.

Having the audience participate in our green initiatives may also lead to similar actions in their everyday lives. In fact, much of our audience already acts sustainably at home, and expects the same when attending our festivals and events.

Read the Festival Republic Sustainability Policy here.


Office

We choose 100% green energy in offices. Our energy supplier puts energy produced from wind, solar, biomass etc, onto the grid, which we in turn buy from them. This is not a ‘green levy’ where an additional fee is used to pay for community based green energy projects and development.

In stationery purchasing, the ‘green choice’ is always the first alternative to consider when ordering. We use Evolve copy paper as it is uses 100% Post Consumer Recycled Paper content. Not a blend of virgin and recycled, and not from off cuts in the paper manufacturing process. The paper we use has had a previous life in homes and offices. We think that’s the best way to go.

We have comprehensive recycling in the office; recycling paper, cardboard, cans, glass bottles and various plastics. We also have a cartridge recycling service.

We use a green cleaning company, with no harmful chemicals used in the cleaning of our offices, making for a safe workplace for our staff and the environment.

Recently Festival Republic moved offices and this gave us an excellent chance to consolidate files and archive. We ‘harvested’ hundreds of lever arch folders which were taken to a scrap store project for redistribution to community groups including pre-schools and child care centres. We also disposed of our electronic equipment safely, with our old monitors and computer equipment making their way into the recycling system.


Waste & Recycling

Each of the areas our festivals and events are held have different recycling and waste facilities. We work with our waste contractor for each show to develop the best solution for each event. This may include active recycling by festival goers (such as at Latitude Festival), incentive based recycling projects (such as our bag of rubbish for a can of beer campaign or 10p deposit/refunds on pint cups at Reading & Leeds Festivals).

We plan to continually improve our waste management aiming to maximise recycling rates and minimise volume of waste to landfill. Additionally options are evolving in the waste management industry, such as new energy from landfill sites opening which we hope to work with in coming years.


Energy
Powering our events has an environmental impact both through using up non-renewable resources, and through CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions. We are working on solutions such as biofuels, microgeneration (solar/wind) and other options such as reducing demand. Keep an eye out for these renewable energy sources onsite this year.

Green Messengers

Places are now FULL for Green Messengers. Thanks to all those that applied! Can't wait to see you all at the festival.

If you have applied, see below for what you'll be doing - and likewise, for those that haven't applied, try next year!

Green Messengers get a pass to the festival and will need to do 24 hours volunteering over Wednesday 14th to Monday 19th July.

You will do some or all of the following:

• Hand out bin bags to people on arrival.
• Tell the campers about the recycling initiatives, especially promoting the idea of packing their camping gear down and taking it home.
• Be stationed at the sets of recycling bins throughout the campsites and arena telling people what bin to put their recycling and composting in. You will be armed with a litter picking stick and be required to pick out the wrong stuff that gets thrown in the wrong bin when you’re not looking. Shifts go on until about 10pm.

You need to be:

• Over 18 years at the time of the festival.
• Be willing to pay a shift deposit of £234 (which includes £9 non-refundable PayPal fee) in advance via PayPal which will be refunded one month after the festival to your bank account, assuming you complete your shifts.
• Have approval to work in the UK if not an EU citizen (holiday work permits are accepted).
• Work 24 hours, on shifts allocated by us, Thursday - Monday.
• Arrive on site Wednesday 14th July morning before 12pm.

You will camp in crew camping with access to hot showers and nice loos.
You won’t get free meals though, sorry.

Industry Green

Julie’s Bicycle (JB) is partnering with us as part of their work helping the UK music community reduce its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. 

JB is a not for profit company that brings together music biz know-how and climate science to research where we’re at now, and what a low carbon music experience should look like.

Its primary goal is to reduce the GHG emissions which cause climate change. Emissions come from many sources: the energy used for lighting and sound, the waste that ends up in landfill which produces methane, water and sewerage treatment (which has its own substantial energy demands!) and audience travel.

JB looked at the biggest festivals in the UK last summer and found that 60% of all cars driven to festivals have 2 or less people in them – given that audiences getting to  festivals produces over two thirds of its carbon emissions you can all help  festivals go green - share cars, travel by coach and train or get on your bike.

To help festivals reduce their emissions JB has developed Industry Green. It’s a way of measuring and managing an event’s climate impacts over time and – most important of all – taking steps to reduce it. Looked at this way, Latitude is a science experiment with a great soundtrack on the Sunshine Coast – with a lot of work going on behind the scenes measuring, monitoring, calculating and predicting our emissions impacts. The result is a better festival for you and a better festival for the planet.

For more info go to www.juliesbicycle.com

Hydrogen Fuel Cell powers Theatre Arena

London’s Arcola Theatre, renowned for having the world’s first fuel cell powered studio, has taken a brave new step in delivering low energy lighting and hydrogen fuel cell power for this year’s Latitude Festival.

Working with regular partners White Light, Selecon, ETC and PixelRange, Arcola Theatre provided lighting for the entire Theatre Arena using a mixture of LED and low power tungsten technologies; cutting power consumption by over 70%.

A 5kW Gencore fuel cell, supplied by London Hydrogen Partnership in association with Logan Energy, powered the entire lighting rig, with hydrogen provided by BOC. The fuel cell operates almost silently producing nothing but electricity and clean water.

Arcola have enjoyed great success in delivering low power lighting in their own studios, but Latitude presented new challenges – not least that the theatre tent was not blacked-out so the lighting needed to compete with, or rather complement, daylight.

The fuel cell and low energy lighting add to organiser Festival Republic’s efforts to reduce the environmental impact of the entire event, including solar showers and reusable cups. This project is part of Arcola Theatre’s extensive range of sustainability activities, collectively referred to as Arcola Energy.

Arcola’s Executive Director Dr Ben Todd said:

“Latitude is a great opportunity to push the boundaries of fuel cell and low energy lighting technologies in a high pressure daylight environment. By powering the Theatre Arena we demonstrated these technologies, at close quarters, to 20 leading theatre companies and 25,000 festival-goers. We look forward to being part of many more green events”.

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