On the venue’s jumbotrons, one slide — interspersed with images of environmental advocacy groups — reminded people to recycle and compost at the show.
Johnson used to gaze out after shows at an “ocean” of single-use plastic littering the floors where the audience stood, he told The Washington Post in an interview this month. Now, he said, things like the reusable-pint-cup program and water refilling stations have dramatically reduced the waste he sees.
“When you look out, it’s beautiful,” Johnson said.
Millions of people flock to concerts and festivals during summers, when warm days and cool nights can be spent enjoying live music. But experts say these shows can harm the planet. Concertgoers and performers’ travel, along with the energy venues use to power performances, often require burning fossil fuels that generate greenhouse gas emissions.
Johnson is one of a growing number of artists pledging to make their tours more environmentally friendly as they take that toll into account. Singers and bands often work with nonprofit organizations and venues where they perform to make sure events can, in various ways, reduce the industry’s carbon footprint.
Even bands that have done the most to tackle their own environmental impact — such as Pearl Jam, which began offsetting its world tours’ estimated carbon emissions in 2003 — are not immune to the effects of climate change. Last week, the legendary grunge band canceled a concert in Vienna after announcing that smoke from wildfires in France had damaged lead singer Eddie Vedder’s throat.
Coldplay, Billie Eilish and Harry Styles and others have now joined the ranks of artists making climate pledges. Some are surveying fans’ modes of transportation to get to concerts, eliminating single-use plastic at concessions and offering merchandise made with recycled materials in an effort to curb overall tour-related emissions.
The efforts have also largely gained momentum among well-funded artists — underscoring the money and time it takes to help make a tour sustainable.
“We are very blessed that we have the resources to be able to do it, because it’s very expensive to try these things for the first time,” said Chris Martin, the lead singer of Coldplay, in a May interview with the Associated Press. “We’re so privileged that we’re in a position where we can change.”
To make concerts environmentally friendly, musicians often seek guidance from outside coordinators who can organize sustainability initiatives — a process that requires resources many artists don’t have.
Josh Kolenik, manager and member of the band Small Black, said the group doesn’t have much time to plan sustainability efforts between performing and working as its own crew.
“We all wear a lot of hats,” Kolenik said about the four band members. “You kinda need that extra person to work with the venues.”
Small Black used a hybrid van for travel to reduce emissions during its most recent tour this spring. Kolenik said it could be helpful if venues had amps and drum sets available for them to use at shows, so artists could further cut down their emissions, though he acknowledged smaller clubs face financial constraints as well.
For Johnson, growing up in Hawaii, he would see beaches “colorful” with plastic, areas where microplastics blended seamlessly with sand — experiences that helped make environmentalism a natural part of his music career. He has been incorporating sustainability into his tours since the early 2000s. As more artists pledge to do the same, he said the movement has gained traction. He pointed in particular to younger musicians, for whom “it’s just more a part of their standard vocabulary.”
On Johnson’s current tour, $2 from each concert ticket goes toward carbon offset projects and environmental nonprofit groups. About $35,000 was raised from a Friday show in Maryland.
Tanner Watt, director of partnership and development at the nonprofit REVERB, acknowledged that at every show, no matter the artist, “there’s always some footprint of waste.” But there are ways to curb it.
A report released last year by the United Kingdom-based Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research said music industry stakeholders can help significantly reduce tour-related emissions by monitoring things such as transportation and energy usage. Doing so can help keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius, compared to preindustrial levels, the report said.
Carly McLachlan, one of the report’s contributors, said in an email that it’s important for artists to consider sustainability options in show design, tour routes and transportation from the early stages of creating a tour — rather than “bringing someone in to ‘green’ what you already planned.”
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