Glastonbury leads the way on rubbish

[guypjfreak]

Where glastonbury goes others follow. 

I've noticed that after the success of the no plastic and finally getting the leave no trace message across to festival goers that other festivals like boomtown are doing the same.. 

Boomtown has asked that everyone uses reusable bottles and has water cans instead of plastic bottles 

And so has camp bestival and other festivals so I'd just like to say well done glasto and well done each festival goer that helped to change things....

I think this is the first year I've seen people go out of their way to use the bins.. Also walking across the pyramid stage at 4am and actually noticing the lack of plastic.

So top of the range old sons I hope this is the start of cleaner festivals all round.. 

https://www.boomtownfair.co.uk/news/2019-05-07-green-week-huge-news/

https://www.campbestival.net/news/plastic-were-going-to-can-it/

[dotdash79]

Kendal Calling stopped the sale of single use bottles last year.

I'm of to tramline this weekend so will be interested to see what that is like

[Watergirl]

Yes. Received an email from Cambridge Folk Festival where I’ll be going and they are also banning single use plastic. Way to go!

[gigpusher]

Would like to see all gig venues do this as well although find it hard to believe they would let you bring a reusable bottle to most venues. 

[Rufus Gwertigan]

I have worked with the litter crew at a number of festivals and in my view Glastonbury are not exactly leaders. I have worked at festivals of 10 to 15k ten years ago and all the fields where virtually pristine at the end of the festival. 

[stuartbert two hats]

To be fair, Glastonbury was massively behind lots of other festivals in lots of ways. Late to the reusable cups, not the first to banning plastic (Blue Dot is one that did it last year). It's excuse is it's scale because things become that much harder when you're utterly massive.

But it's scale is what makes it so important. I had no idea that Blue Dot had even banned plastic until I looked up why all the water was in cans. Even though the likes of Shambala have been cleaner for years, the impact of Emily Eavis' tweet of the overhead shot has so much impact because of how famous Glastonbury is.  And bloody Blue Dot didn't have any free drinking water that I could find. Bastards.

So it does set an example, and it does blaze a trail, but it's not the best and it's not the first.

Edited July 18, 2019 by stuartbert two hats

[whitehorses]

Yes, interesting thoughts.

A question: Why are water cans thought to be so much better than plastic bottles? They hold less and can’t be sealed (truly single use!). Plus, the extraction of bauxite for the aluminium is a horror show. Both are dumb, but water in aluminium seems even more absurdly wasteful than water in plastic to me. 

Yes, cans can be readily recycled (and kept in a recycling loop) but similarly PET plastic bottles are one of the most recycled objects in the UK. 

We hear that 1 million fewer plastic bottles were sold, but we don’t hear how many extra aluminium cans were sold in replacement. 

 

 

[stuartbert two hats]

9 minutes ago, caballosblancos said:

Yes, interesting thoughts.

A question: Why are water cans thought to be so much better than plastic bottles? They hold less and can’t be sealed (truly single use!). Plus, the extraction of bauxite for the aluminium is a horror show. Both are dumb, but water in aluminium seems even more absurdly wasteful than water in plastic to me. 

Yes, cans can be readily recycled (and kept in a recycling loop) but similarly PET plastic bottles are one of the most recycled objects in the UK. 

We hear that 1 million fewer plastic bottles were sold, but we don’t hear how many extra aluminium cans were sold in replacement. 

I think the main advantage is that plastic can only be recycled 2 or 3 times before it's so low grade it has to be put in the pavement or landfill.

Aluminium, on the other hand can be recycled over and over and over again, with barely any loss in quality. 

Plus, aluminium is more prone to breaking down in the environment than plastics, even if aluminium oxide actually creates a barrier to prevent further corrosion, it's still much

Having said all that, you sound like you know more about this than me - do any of those reasons hold water? It's a bit late and my phone is a bit too small to Google away to fact check myself -although I did research one bit, see if you can guess which

[august1]

I thought this thread was about the other stage line up

[found home in 2009]

8 hours ago, stuartbert two hats said:

I think the main advantage is that plastic can only be recycled 2 or 3 times before it's so low grade it has to be put in the pavement or landfill.

Aluminium, on the other hand can be recycled over and over and over again, with barely any loss in quality. 

Plus, aluminium is more prone to breaking down in the environment than plastics, even if aluminium oxide actually creates a barrier to prevent further corrosion, it's still much

Having said all that, you sound like you know more about this than me - do any of those reasons hold water? It's a bit late and my phone is a bit too small to Google away to fact check myself -although I did research one bit, see if you can guess which

It's an interesting point. I used to like buying a water bottle from an ice-cream van at the start of the festival then reusing it over duration of festival. If I got one with Tor on it i'd even keep using it for few weeks after festival. 

This year I had a refillable bottle, but a couple of times bought cans of water when nearby taps had long queues. Was that worse? As you say cans are still waste

[eFestivals]

10 hours ago, guypjfreak said:

Where glastonbury goes others follow. 

erm .... many of those other festivals had announced their own improvement plans long before Glastonbury did.  

[uscore]

53 minutes ago, found home in 2009 said:

It's an interesting point. I used to like buying a water bottle from an ice-cream van at the start of the festival then reusing it over duration of festival. If I got one with Tor on it i'd even keep using it for few weeks after festival. 

This year I had a refillable bottle, but a couple of times bought cans of water when nearby taps had long queues. Was that worse? As you say cans are still waste

The heat made it quite a first year to be dealing with the no-plastic rule.  Personally I have never drunk so much water at a Glastonbury, and I've been going for decades.  On the Saturday I must have refilled my bottle 10 times.   You have to assume that ordinarily the queues wouldn't be anything like as bad, and you wouldn't need to buy any cans.

[whitehorses]

8 hours ago, stuartbert two hats said:

I think the main advantage is that plastic can only be recycled 2 or 3 times before it's so low grade it has to be put in the pavement or landfill.

Aluminium, on the other hand can be recycled over and over and over again, with barely any loss in quality. 

Plus, aluminium is more prone to breaking down in the environment than plastics, even if aluminium oxide actually creates a barrier to prevent further corrosion, it's still much

Having said all that, you sound like you know more about this than me - do any of those reasons hold water? It's a bit late and my phone is a bit too small to Google away to fact check myself -although I did research one bit, see if you can guess which

Well they’re not awful reasons. It’s certainly true that PET can only be recycled a few times before it’s low grade. But it’s also low impact, cheap, and very light, and could be burnt end of life to recover the energy. 

I don’t know how about degradability of aluminium in the environment, but will look it up! But Glastonbury is in effect a closed system, they can control everything that enters and leaves (give or take) so there’s no reason why that thinking should be a factor. If they wanted they could mechanically sort *all* the festival’s rubbish and recycle everything possible, including food waste in their biodigester. 

The waste hierarchy is reduce > reuse > recycle. Plastic bottles can be reused many times, aluminium cans can’t. 

Like all these things it’s complicated but I don’t think the posturing around plastic water bottles is quite as impressive as lots of others seem to (from environmental grounds). It was really impressive to see how religiously people took their water bottle filling though, so it clearly worked from that perspective. 

 

 

 

[gigpusher]

I'd say most people used a truly reusable bottle. I personally only used my stainless steel bottle and bought no cans over the entire festival. Also, don't Glastonbury have their own forge so can probably recycle cans on site. Plastic bottles shouldn't be reused as you end up ingesting plastic. We eat a credit card worth of plastic a week which can't be good for us. 

[shuttlep]

I did think that they took all the water bottles off site, so no plastic and then gave free water away. (amazing) but then they ran out of water. They banned all that water from being on site and then seemed surprised when they started to run low on water themselves. I know it was a hot year and if it rained it would have replenished the water. Maybe something they need to think of next time.

 

they also need to stop (mainly females) showering at the bloody water taps. causes massive queues and wastes loads of water.

[stuie]

They are still serving drinks in single use cups at all bars apart from crew bars.

Other festivals have switched totally to reusable cups.

I understand that the size of Glasto makes this logistically more difficult but it also makes it more important.

Sorry to say I don't think they are leading here.

Also, I struggle with the idea of buying water in cans - it seems as wasteful as a single use bottle to me.   They should only sell the reusable bottles to be filled up at the taps.

 

[stuartbert two hats]

49 minutes ago, shuttlep said:

I did think that they took all the water bottles off site, so no plastic and then gave free water away. (amazing) but then they ran out of water. They banned all that water from being on site and then seemed surprised when they started to run low on water themselves. I know it was a hot year and if it rained it would have replenished the water. Maybe something they need to think of next time.

 

they also need to stop (mainly females) showering at the bloody water taps. causes massive queues and wastes loads of water.

Who ran out of water? Glastonbury didn't.

[barcelonista1899]

7 minutes ago, stuie said:

They are still serving drinks in single use cups at all bars apart from crew bars.

Other festivals have switched totally to reusable cups.

 

But once the festival is over, what happens to all the "reusable" plastic cups? They are also a pain when they get smashed into little 

I thought this year the cups at Glastonbury were 100% biodegradable and didn't have that plastic coating that had stopped them from being so before? They certainly seemed more flimsy!  Definitely made it harder trying to hold a cider cup with your teeth whilst going for a wee! 

I've no idea which one would be better for the environment! 

[stuie]

4 minutes ago, stuartbert two hats said:

Who ran out of water? Glastonbury didn't.

Apparently they had less than 20% remaining which is why the showers were banned across the site.  This isn't quite 'ran out' though.

[stuartbert two hats]

1 minute ago, stuie said:

Apparently they had less than 20% remaining which is why the showers were banned across the site.  This isn't quite 'ran out' though.

Given the extreme prolonged heat, it seems like they had perfectly adequate water supplies.

[stuie]

10 minutes ago, barcelonista1899 said:

But once the festival is over, what happens to all the "reusable" plastic cups?

Polypropylene is recyclable and they'll likely become reusable cups once more.

6 minutes ago, stuartbert two hats said:

Given the extreme prolonged heat, it seems like they had perfectly adequate water supplies.

I agree - and reserves back to levels which allowed showers to be turned back on by Sunday.

[guypjfreak]

12 hours ago, stuartbert two hats said:

To be fair, Glastonbury was massively behind lots of other festivals in lots of ways. Late to the reusable cups, not the first to banning plastic (Blue Dot is one that did it last year). It's excuse is it's scale because things become that much harder when you're utterly massive.

But

2 hours ago, uscore said:

The heat made it quite a first year to be dealing with the no-plastic rule.  Personally I have never drunk so much water at a Glastonbury, and I've been going for decades.  On the Saturday I must have refilled my bottle 10 times.   You have to assume that ordinarily the queues wouldn't be anything like as bad, and you wouldn't need to buy any cans.

 

it's scale is what makes it so important. I had no idea that Blue Dot had even banned plastic until I looked up why all the water was in cans. Even though the likes of Shambala have been cleaner for years, the impact of Emily Eavis' tweet of the overhead shot has so much impact because of how famous Glastonbury is.  And bloody Blue Dot didn't have any free drinking water that I could find. Bastards.

So it does set an example, and it does blaze a trail, but it's not the best and it's not the first.

I agree but not festivals the of glastonbury old son.. I might be wrong but still a good achievement imo

I've met up with some of yous and at one such meeting it was about 12 and I didn't start on my cider till about 3 and that was from the bar cos it was cold lol 

[whitehorses]

2 hours ago, gigpusher said:

Plastic bottles shouldn't be reused as you end up ingesting plastic. We eat a credit card worth of plastic a week which can't be good for us. 

Is this true? Got a serious source? They can’t be re-used forever, sure, but had always thought a few times was fine.

If it is true, then good point! 

[whitehorses]

And agree with the comments about single use cups from the bars. Most of the Glasto litter this year was these and stinking food trays. Plastic bottles and cans are far easier things to handle than sagging old curry and chips on a plate!  

Always liked GreenMan’s and BlueDots (and others) hard plastic re-usable pots. At GreenMan they carried a return fee, so hordes of kids would pick up any abandoned cups for some pocket money.

Seemed sensible though that was a few years ago, so might have changed... 

[gigpusher]

15 minutes ago, caballosblancos said:

Is this true? Got a serious source? They can’t be re-used forever, sure, but had always thought a few times was fine.

If it is true, then good point! 

The credit card a week is not just from plastic bottles but it can't help.

 https://www.thedrum.com/news/2019/06/13/people-told-they-are-eating-credit-card-every-week-new-wwf-campaign