'Green Footsteps' - a step in the right direction?

This year the organisers of the Roskilde Festival (all profits go to support humanitarian and cultural causes) are running a Green Footsteps campaign, empowering young people to make changes and reduce their carbon footprint.

The idea is simple – all ticket holders will be sent information about ten ways or ‘footsteps’ to take action against climate change leading up to the festival. For example, they can decide to ride their bike to the event or identify ways to reduce their home energy consumption. And it is not simply a question of pledging to complete the ‘footsteps’, you have to prove that you have done it, for example, sending photos of your recycling sorting system or registering with the Danish Saving Trust and sending in the results of your online home energy audit.

Completing 3 footprints reserves you a central spot in the Climate Community camping area at the festival, where there is LED lighting, pedal charging points and a Climate University where you can chat to climate change experts and activists.

Part of me loves this campaign – not only is it raising awareness about climate change but it is also empowering people with the knowledge, mechanisms and incentive to act now. However is the idea of a Climate Community just a bit exclusive? Why not reach out to everyone attending by integrating climate-friendly initiatives and products throughout the festival in order to reach audience members who might not otherwise take any interest? Why have one sustainable stage when all the stages could feature low-energy lighting, LED screens and generators run on renewables?

To be fair, the organisers do take the environmental impact of the event seriously and have won awards to prove it, and obviously there is a balance to strike because organisers don’t want to put people off by bombarding them with green messages – ultimately the aim is to sell tickets and raise money for charity.

Perhaps Green Footsteps in its current form is just the start of something which will grow and become a model for all festivals. It will be really interesting to see how it turns out!