Festival Vibe!

Spring is in town! The thing that I most look forward to when good weather hits our country is the festival season. This feeling becomes even stronger when festivals announce their line-up, or when friends start posting official aftermovies of last year on their facebook wall. Those festival-lovers among you know what I’m talking about ;). But let’s take a look at this picture:

Festivals require a lot of organization, transportation, logistics and energy. Above all, they create tons of waste. Therefore, it’s important that the organizers also try to be ecological. Here are a few examples - original, simple and effective - of how different Belgian festivals try to be eco-friendly!

• To save paper, all the major festivals, like Rock Werchter for example, will offer their programme by means of an application. 
• No festival without fast food. Pukkelpop offers green fries to its visitors: they are produced without any CO₂ emission. What’s more, the peels of the potatoes are used to generate green electricity, that provides 7000 homes with energy!
• In 2012, Sfinx wants to be recognized as a green festival. The festival will even install a wind engine. They want to know how much energy can be created with it. At any rate, people will be able to recharge their phone thanks to this wind mill.
• Sfinx also cooperates with ‘Opnieuw & Co’, an enterprise that gives a second life to abandoned stuff. At the camping site, there will be a container in which you can dump stuff that is waste to you, but can still be useful to others.

To end, I would like to point out that we, the party people, also share responsibility. The organizers can hand out garbage bags at the camping sites, but it’s our responsibility to actually use them.

What do you think about these green measures? Do you pay attention to eco-friendliness when choosing a festival? Would you be prepared to pay a higher price for a greener festival? Feel free to comment!

Finally, to those who are still trying to seize upon a ticket for Tomorrowland; good luck! 

Karen V.