At Reading festival we aim to reduce the environmental impact of the festival and since 2007 we have been putting in place a number of initiatives so you can help us by doing your part, while still having an awesome festival.

In reward to these efforts we are very pleased to announce that Reading festival has achieved a three star Industry Green rating, a certification that is the leading mark of achievement on environmental sustainability within the creative industries and is administered by Julie’s Bicycle, an independent, not for profit organisation.

Reading festival is currently the only festival in the UK (along with Latitude festival) to hold a three star rating which is the highest possible achievement for Industry Green, So a BIG THANKS to everyone who disposed of their waste responsibly, picked up their tent on Monday morning and used the coach or shared their car journey to travel to Reading. Without your help we would not have been able to achieve this accolade.

ECO TRAVEL
Do you know that the biggest CO2 impact on festivals is simply through the audience travelling to get there? 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 or the coach!

ECOTRAVEL FACTS
1-    Travelling in a full coach is the greenest form of motor transport.
2-    Travelling by train emits three and half times less CO2 than travelling alone by car.
3-    If you must bring your car, please consider transporting as many people as possible and travelling at off peak times. This reduces congestion considerably and for every extra person in your car you drastically reduce the amount of CO2 emissions per person. Having four people in a car actually brings the CO2 per person down to less than on a train!
4-    If every car coming to Reading Festival had 4 people in it, there could be almost 3000 fewer cars and a reduction in CO2 emissions of almost 240 tonne!

CO2 Emissions per passenger per Km:
•    Coach: 30g
•    Big Car: 272.4g
•    Train: 53.4g
Based on 2010 DEFRA audience transport analysis of occupancy, car numbers and average drive distances.

YOUR CANS COUNT…AND NOW YOUR PLASTIC BOTTLES TOO!
Bring back a bagful of cans or plastic bottles to the Recycle Exchanges in the campgrounds, and we’ll give you a free can of beer or cider. It’s that simple.

We’ll even give you the bag to collect the cans in. They’ll be handed out at wristband exchange when you enter the site, by our Green Messengers wandering the campgrounds, from your campsite manager’s caravan, and also from the Recycle Exchanges.

WATER BOTTLE DEPOSIT
To work towards getting all the plastic water bottles recycled, each bottle of water sold at the festival will have a 20p deposit charged. When you’ve finished, bring back the empty bottle to the refund points to get your 20p back. Only water FR sold at stores onsite will be refundable. Other plastic bottles should be placed in the recycling bins.

PINT CUP DEPOSIT
You’ll pay a 10p deposit when you buy your drinks in cups over the bars. You’ll get back the 10p when you return your cups to the refund points. Each year more than 90% of the cups have been returned. Just amazing – that’s more than 6 tonnes of cardboard which was diverted from landfill.

EVERY CAN COUNTS
Drinks can recycling programme, Every Can Counts, will be at Reading in 2013 offering incentives for recycling those many hundreds of thousands of drink cans which make their way onsite. Look out for our inflatable football game, where you have a chance of winning free festival tickets for next year simply by recycling your cans and having a go.

In 2012 and in partnership with Reading Festival, Every Can Counts launched a competition in search of three Student Recycling Champions. The students will get the chance to see behind the scenes of this major music event as well as the opportunity to see all aspects of the festival’s recycling operation, working closely with Every Can Counts and the waste management team to interact with festival-goers and encourage them to recycle more on site.

By bringing us your cans, you’re not only doing your bit for the environment and reducing the festival’s carbon footprint; you also stand a good chance of winning fantastic prizes!

Check out our festival photos from 2012 last year on the Facebook page or for more information on the student competition visit www.everycancounts.co.uk

POST-EVENT SALVAGE
Every year, thousands of tents, sleeping bags and camping mats are left behind after the festival, along with things like wellies, radios, and clothes. Please pack up your gear and take it home, ready for your next festival weekend. Not only will you save money, you’re helping the environment by not wasting the resources and energy needed to make all that stuff over and again.

If you really don’t want your camping gear, please pack it up and hand it into the Tent Donation points in the campgrounds , next to the Recycling Points. Donated gear will make their way to charitable and community organisations.

We will have separate collection bays for:

• Tents, Sleeping Mats, Sleeping Bags
• Chairs
• General camping bits and pieces
• Wellies
• Clothes
• Unopened food

Look out for the collection points that will pop up on Monday morning on your way out of the campgrounds.

We need you to take down your tents yourself and then hand them in to the donation points. It is impossible for us to take down all the tents left abandoned even if they are in perfect condition.

Tents left standing will go to landfill and damage our environment. So, don’t leave your tent. Pack it. Hand it in. Change lives!

FOOD DRIVE
The Salvation Army are here again at the Festival. The Salvation Army is very aware of the needs both in the local community and world-wide and they are participating in the food drive, so if you have any unwanted non-perishable food left over or would like to make a donation of a can, then please do so at the Recycle Exchanges. All food donated will be used in the local community to help those who are less well off than most of us. Alternatively they can be donated at the Salvation Army marquee on G4.

HANDY TIPS FOR GREEN CAMPERS
•  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, not to mention the fire risk. 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
• If you must use your car, then please consider a car 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 or exit 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.

BUYING STUFF
Limiting the amount of STUFF you kit yourself out with to come to the festival really helps reduce the overall environmental impact of the festival. Before you buy anything for the festival (or even in everyday life), please take the time to watch this 20 minute film The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard.

www.storyofstuff.com
 

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.

In the 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. It is 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 through 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.
 

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. There are bike racks available at Reading train station. See the Travel page for more details

COACH IS BEST: Coaches are the greenest form of motor transport, 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.
 

Free goCarShare Priority Parking

We are excited to announce that goCarShare Priority Parking will be returning to Reading this year. Cars involved in the car share will be able to park right by the festival entrance, and will be entered into a draw to win a pair of tickets for 2014.

Laurel Collective Session, goCarShare 2012

Why Travel by goCarShare?
goCarShare creates an exciting new way to travel. It connects drivers and passengers heading the same way, so that they can both save money and have fun journeys.
It's built around Facebook so you can see if people heading the same way like the same music or are friends' friends.

Join in here!

Terms and Conditions / How it Works
The first 300 drivers who add a car share request and confirm two passengers on goCarShare will receive a special bumper sticker.
To be sure to receive your bumper sticker you'll need to have a minimum of two confirmed passengers on goCarShare by August 12th. Add your details on the site as early as possible to maximise the chance of travelling in a full car and being eligible.
Drivers confirm passengers that have messaged them by logging in to gocarshare.com and clicking on the 'My Journeys' tab at the top of the page.
Drivers will receive their bumper stickers at least a week in advance of the competition. You will need to display your bumper sticker on the car to get entry to the priority car park.
All eligible cars that have a minimum of two confirmed passengers (three people in total) by the cut off date of August 12th will receive a special code.
Entrants should hand in their code upon arrival at the goCarShare priority car park for a chance to win two tickets for 2014.
If you have any questions about anything please contact hello@gocarshare.com.
Festival Republic reserves the right to amend the competition details if necessary circumstances arise.
Entrants must be 18 years or older.

Safety Advice
·          Arrange to meet in a public place
·          Notify a friend of your travel details: who you are travelling with, where you are travelling to and when you expect to arrive.
·          Show each other valid ID (e.g. a driving licence or photo identification) before travelling.
·          Having a home telephone number for the person you are sharing with is a sensible precaution.
·          Take your mobile phone with you.
·          Festival-goers can choose to restrict car sharing solely with members of the same sex if they prefer.
·          Festival-goers are reminded that they are under no obligation to share a journey with the person arranged, if you have any doubts about the person you have agreed to share with or the vehicle, you are advised not to make the journey.
·          Remember that the festival does not arrange car sharing or have any liability to or for car sharers. All arrangements that you make are private arrangements between yourself and the other sharers.

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. ABSOLUTELY NO POLYSTYRENE packaging to be present onsite. Any brought in with deliveries must be taken away by trader.
• 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 Recycling 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.

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

• 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

RECYCLING & COMPOSTING

COMPOST IT – Food scraps, plates, bowls, coffee cups, clear cups, cutlery, napkins, pizza boxes, chip cartons.

When you buy food from the traders at Reading Festival, everything your food comes in is biodegradable so plates, cutlery, napkins and coffee cups can be placed in the compost bins. 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.

CAMPERS' WASTE KITS
When you arrive onsite, you will be given your Campers' 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.

- 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.
 

Despite our efforts to promote the idea of packing up camping gear and taking it home or at least donate their gear at one of the donation points, not all campers do so. Still every year, thousands of tents, sleeping bags and camping mats are left behind after the festival, along with things like wellies, radios, clothes and unopened food. As it is impossible for us to take down all the tents that are left abandoned even if they are in perfect condition, so we are looking to recruit a salvage operation team. Last year our salvage operation managed to divert nearly 20 tonnes of reusable camping gear at Reading festival. To achieve even better results at this year’s festival we are looking for individuals or organisations to collect reusable products and material that gets left behind.

You need to provide:

• A name of your organisation
• A number of how many people you will bring onsite.
• Information of vehicles makes and number (with driver names and vehicle registration number) 
• information about the weight & material you collect.

The registration is open now! - To submit your application please follow the link below:

Reading

Please note the registration deadline is Friday the 15^th August.

For further enquiries, please do not hesitate to get in touch salvage@festivalrepublic.com

These volunteer positions help work the recycling initiatives throughout the festival. You need to be full of energy, not mind getting your hands dirty and are a passionate recycler. If you don’t have a green bone in your body, don’t bother applying – unless you go and get yourself a crash course on recycling and the environment – then come back to us!

You will do some or all of the following:
• Be stationed at the sets of recycling bins throughout the campgrounds telling people what bin to put their recycling 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 are not looking. You may also do some litter picking around the roadway your bin’s stationed on. Daytime shifts only.
• Be part of our Recycle Exchange team. You will receive bags of cans and other rubbish from the campers and encouraging them separate their waste responsibly. You will need to be a bit bossy as well as nice for this job as you will have to make the people pick out any ‘contaminants’ from the bags they bring back.
• Be part of our Compost Crew. These will be highly sought after arena jobs, so volunteers will need to jump through a few hoops to get put on this role. The Compost Crew will rove around the arena with a handy hoop and a litter picking stick working as mobile compost bins. This is so people don’t have to sit in other’s squished kebabs and also so we capture the estimated 70% of compostable waste produced in the arena ends up as compost and not as methane puffing out of a landfill. OK, so not such a glamorous job, but you will get to hear the bands.
•    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.
•    Staffing Tent Recycling points on the Monday morning.
•    Working in the sorting area to re-pack all the donated gear.
•    Salvaging and scavenging good quality re-usable gear that’s left in the campsites, to go to charity and community organisations.

You need to be:
• Over 18 years at the time of the festival.
• Be willing to pay a shift deposit of £234 in advance which will be refunded one month after the festival, assuming you complete your shifts. (Please note we will refund you £225 as £9 is a non refundable PayPal fee).
• Have approval to work in the UK if not an EU citizen (holiday work permits are OK).
• Work 24 hours, on shifts allocated by us, between the Wednesday before the show and Tuesday after the show. (Please be advised that the allocation of all shifts will be at the discretion of the Green Messengers’ Team).
• Arrive on site Tuesday before the show.

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

THE REGISTRATION IS OPEN NOW! – To submit your application please click HERE