Environmental sustainability is high on our agenda
We want to be better. We want our clients to be better. We want our suppliers to be better.
We want you to hold us accountable and we want to do the same for you to ensure we do our best for our planet.
15% of UNSW’s run-off water drains into an infiltration tank in our loading dock. The water collected is reused in toilets, labs and the YMCA pool.
We use recycled paper products. From our marketing collateral to our toilet paper.
Our air conditioning and venue lighting operates on timers to increase energy efficiency.
We separate our waste into compost, paper recycling, mixed recycling and general waste in office spaces.
We reuse venue signage to cut down on printing.
We have implemented a venue-wide plastic straw ban across all events and day-trade at our bar.
We offer our clients water stations with glasses and jugs instead of plastic water bottles.
We have implemented simple solutions to cut out plastic from our artists’ riders, such as offering water jugs and glasses instead of water bottles and using poly carb vessels vs single use plastics.
We work closely working with Tomra collection to effectively recycle all bottled and canned products
Thirsty Burger, our in-house burger joint, switched from cardboard to reusable poly card baskets for food service.
TZG Architects won the NSW Architecture Award for Sustainable Architecture in 2019 for the Roundhouse refurbishment project.
We ask that our clients consider their sustainable initiatives at events and we can support those efforts.
We can provide information on public transport to pass on to guests.
We offer sustainable signage solutions including the use of our LED entrance screen and chalk boards.
We can refer our clients to suppliers who offer a range of sustainable event solutions, speak to your event manager who can provide more detail.
We liaise with our caterers to ensure they reduce their packaging and use eco-friendly packaging where possible and ensure all transportation of catering is kept to a minimum.
Each of our caterers ensures that food wastage is kept to a minimum and work with clients to cater to the appropriate numbers. If there is additional catering the caterers collect it and sort it at their HQs, where it is either composted or collected by OzHarvest or other similar services.
All caterers have agreed to use either biodegradable packaging, recyclable packaging or re-usable cutlery and crockery when serving food. If you would like to know more about catering sustainability, your Event Manager will be happy to send through further information or put you in touch with our caterers.
Ziggy Alberts played a sold-out show to 2,200 fans in February 2019. The Sydney artist is passionate about sustainable touring. We worked with his team to reduce its environmental impact by implementing simple initiatives to cut down on single use plastic.
Mirerva spoke to us and our clients at ‘Round the Room – Sustaining the Events Industry’ in April and gave us these top tips.
Consider the life cycle of your lunch, your administration, your travel. At what steps could you make small differences
Do you need to wrap your lunch in glad wrap, or could it go into a reusable container?
Keep your keep cup in your bag or take a mug to get your coffee each day.
Compost – even in apartments you can use small systems like the Bokashi Bin.
Buy food from local farmer markets that have better produce at cheaper prices and in season. They also use less plastic and the food miles are shorter. Food also lasts longer.
Buy in bulk, buy dried goods at companies like The Source.
Instagram have some great accounts to follow and can be found using tags like #plasticfree #wastefree
Partner with local councils and local utilities. The Choose Tap program often is linked to councils who can offer water stations, or, Hydration Stations.
Green Music Australia also have campaigns and provide assistance to address waste at events.
The Victorian Government has done a lot around food waste. This tool might assist.
There are a lot of calculators online that can help tally the requirement for events especially.
It does pay to be conservative on how much food is ordered. Plan for 75% of catering against the number registered, especially if under subscribed. If oversubscribed, it could indicate a popular event that may need to be a little higher than 75%. Also, the time of day an event is conducted can also help with food waste. Consider if the event can be run at alternate times, instead of times of day where larger meals are required, like lunch or dinner.
EarthCheck have a number of products for all levels of investment, that start with assessing the event and desire outcomes, through to measuring the footprint, carbon calculators, offsetting, templates for event plans and measurement tools.
Engaging an operator like EarthCheck also means connecting with other professionals and peers, as well as accessing tips and tricks sent out weekly. Attached is more information but sometimes it just helps to talk to someone to point you in the right direction. Mirerva Holmes can help with this.
The Pitch Festival in Victoria – have a look at the website.
Their communication to delegates before the event was concise, enforced the rules to participate and provided ways in which they could help the festival achieve a minimal footprint.
One of EarthCheck’s clients, Banyan Tree, are considered the ultimate in the tourism sector, starting from a basic intent to move towards sustainability to now having formed a Foundation.
The conference aimed to inspire and challenge delegates in shaping the sustainable transformation of the built environment.
The redevelopments see the installation of a rainwater harvesting tank, a new green space, a redesigned loading dock and the addition of distinctive architectural features.
Keep abreast of the trend sweeping the industry with top advice from Mirerva Holmes, Head of Partnerships and Innovation at EarthCheck; and Will Syddall, Head of Environmental Sustainability at UNSW.
The team has created a trademarked philosophy to raise awareness of their operational principles.
