At the beginning of 2008, John Giddings, organiser and promoter of the Isle of Wight Festival, took Eco Action to make the Isle of Wight Festival a more ecologically aware and sustainable event.

The result a commitment to a five year programme of positive actions that will leave a lasting legacy for the future of the island with initiatives such as long term conservation projects; implementation of local business partnerships in a vow to “keep it local”; plus a year on year improvement in the festival’s operations to limit the impact of over 55,000 visitors.

John Giddings said:

“With the Isle of Wight Council recently announcing their vision of creating an eco island and becoming carbon neutral by 2020, this was definitely the year to put our money when our mouth is and make a positive difference.

Obviously with a festival of this size it would be unrealistic for us to say that from now on the event will be run with zero impact on the environment but more realistic and believable for us to say we are committed to ongoing improvement, with a long term vision to not only reduce our impact but also give something back to the island that hosts our event every June”

Proper Productions has been involved with the event since early March, and the response has been overwhelming. Originally it was thought that there would be very little that could be done for this year’s festival apart from take stock and collect data and information for use at next year’s event, but the enthusiasm and support that has been generated by this initial idea among the Island’s community has meant that there has already been some fantastic ideas as a basic starting point and building block for the future.

Proven energy have confirmed that they will supply a 2.5kw free standing wind turbine adjacent to the main arena, which will provide a percentage of the energy needed to power the backstage area.  Locally supplied biodiesel will be used next year to fuel a number of the festival’s backstage generators and the Proper Productions mobile office will be powered by portable solar panels.

This year’s festival supports Liftshare, the company that encourages people to consider the energy used in travel by enabling people to find travelling companions, and suggesting other more sustainable methods of transport. Presently working with London Bicycle there are a small number of cycles for hire from either the festival site or from East Cowes ferry terminal.

In coming years a more localised food source is intended for the festival, thus benefiting the local market and cutting down the need for excessive transport use and building up the food miles.  Again, starting off small, backstage this year, from Taste of the Wight, a local food collective run by Steve Blamire.

Waste and Recycling is a big challenge, as every event of this size will inevitably produce a large amount of waste. There are two areas to tackle this year. The first is to reduce the amount of waste that’s generated in the first place, and, among other ideas, researching ways to reduce conventional packaging and use more environmentally sustainable alternatives.

The festival this year is going to be a completely ticketless event, secure wristbands will instead be issued. All concession and stall holders are being asked to think more about their impact and to leave as little trace as possible when they leave, and a recycling scheme is planned for vegetable and cooking oil to be turned into biogas fuel.

The waste that is generated is to be deposited in colour coded recycling bins which will be sited in the right places to facilitate easy recycling and disposal of waste.  There are also to be ten decorated bins by local artists, each one celebrating the theme of ten years of the IOW festival.

Working closely with BIFFA, who are in charge of waste management on the Island, most of the waste will be routed through to the new Waste to Energy Plant on the Island, which converts waste material into electricity for more than 2000 homes.

All of the carpet used in the concession stalls and other areas will be recycled into tree mulch, there will be a test quantity of compostable tent pegs given away free on a first come first served basis, and any tents that are in one piece and left by festival-goers will be gathered up and packed down on the Monday by the local scout groups. These will then be reused.

Carbon auditing the festival is another task to try and quantify how much energy is being used, both on the site and by travel to and from the festival. Data is being gathered from previous festivals, and measures put in place to gather the information which is vital to be able to properly carbon audit the event for next year.

Medina High Schools, Green Team are carrying out their own carbon audit on some of the visiting artists.  This year’s festival will see 10,000 trees being planted by the Woodland Trust to offset some of the carbon and energy used in putting the festival on.

Which leads nicely on to this Gift to Nature, a local based organisation that manages and funds environmental projects all over the island are now official corporate partners and are keeping an eye on all of the Eco Action Festival initiatives.Source: Environmental consultants to the music industry, Proper Productions.

Isle of Wight Festival Lift Share Scheme

As part of a continuing effort to make the Isle of Wight Festival greener organisers would like to encourage everyone to take part in a FREE lift share scheme.

Free to use you simply share the travel costs
Links drivers and passengers together online
Part of the largest car sharing scheme in the UK
Reduces the pollution and congestion on our roads

Sign-up for lift share now Click Here:

Isle of Wight Community News @Island Pulse.