This month's Vision: 2025 newsletter is a Sustainable Event Summit Special! 

With less than a month before event organisers and green leaders gather to shape climate action for UK outdoor events, we are pleased to announce the full programme, plus, guest blogs from our panel partners.

REGISTER your free place, download the full programme, and follow the event on linkedin for updates. Get in touch with your questions and suggestions at info@vision2025.org.uk

Event Professionals and Green Leaders Confirmed as Speakers for SES 23

Vision 2025, supported by The Showman’s Show and Festival Republic, continues to shape climate action for the UK outdoor event industry by bringing event organisers, suppliers, climate organisations and green leaders together to share innovations, discuss best practice, and exclusively launch the new environment chapter of the Purple Guide.

The free to attend conference, held on 18th October at Newbury Showground, is open for registration with limited capacity. Read the full programme and register. 

Cathy Runciman, Executive Director of charity EarthPercent UK, opens the Sustainable Event Summit by sharing a vision for sustainable and planet-positive events: the why, the what and the how of actions and advocacy needed for the sector's future.

Earth Percent is a registered charity co-founded by Brian Eno whose mission is to unleash the power of music in service of the planet. Cathy is also the co-founder of storytelling platform Atlas of the Future and curator of Barcelona's Fixing the Future Festival. Find out more and Register for #SES23

In this delicious panel: How outdoor events can work with traders to create sustainable offerings; What are the best solutions for food waste; Compostable packaging and addressing greenwashing issues; assessing the carbon footprint of meals, and supporting audiences to make sustainable choices.

Chair Vikki Chapman, Head of Sustainability UK & Ireland at Live Nation brings her experience of calculating the carbon footprint of food at Live Nation festivals to the conversation with panel guests, Sam Walker, Technical Director at Biopak, Joseph McDonnell, Partnership Executive at Klimato, Mark Laurie, Director at NCASS, and Bonnie May, CEO at Eat To The Beat. Find out more and Register for #SES23

"Climate justice is deeply connected to racial justice, gender and disability, labour rights, land justice, the rights of nature, and environmental justice." 

Initiatives to address environmental impacts can have unforeseen social implications. In this briefing at #SES23 Julie's Bicycle and Attitude is Everything explore how sustainability initiatives at outdoor events can consider the needs of those with accessibility requirements to create a more sustainable event without exacerbating inequality. Read this blog on Climate Justice for Events, by Richard Phillips, Climate Change and Sustainability Specialist for Music at Julie's Bicycle. 

Register your free place at #SES23, 18th October, The Showman's Show.

"Of late, I have been drawn to say that the problem of the climate emergency is no longer one of business action, but of effective public communication." Lewis Jamieson, Co-Founder, Music Declares Emergency 

Focused on creating effective climate communication campaigns, the 'Getting the Message Across' panel at #SES23 is held in collaboration with Music Declares Emergency. Chaired by MDE's Lewis Jamieson with guests Betsy Reed (The Bulb), Hannah Cox (Betternotstop) and Francis Fox (Climate Live), the panel explores mainstreaming climate awareness through cultural engagement; good and bad climate messaging and how to create and curate connections across music for maximum impact. In this guest blog, Lewis shares his thoughts on the potential for the music industry to deliver gains beyond the sector.

Register your free place at #SES23, 18th October, The Showman's Show. 

Chris Johnson (Vision: 2025) and Steve Heap (AFO / EIF) launch the new Environmental Sustainability chapter for The Purple Guide, establishing best practices in environmental sustainability for outdoor events. Find out more and register to attend the launch. 

In a collaboration between The Showman's Show and Vision: 2025, three shortlisted suppliers present innovations to help events reduce environmental impacts from the supply chain live on stage! Judges and #SES23 delegates cast their votes to decide the winner. Find updates on shortlisted suppliers and register. 

"Whether you are pro-battery or not, energy storage systems have a pivotal role to play in decarbonising temporary event power." Tim Benson, Chair, Powerful Thinking

Two decades after the introduction of hybrid solutions to the events market, the 'Rethinking Battery Deployments' panel at the Sustainable Events Summit will explore changes in how battery solutions are deployed across the live sector. Programmed in association with Powerful Thinking and hosted by chair Tim Benson, the panel features contributions from Arena Group and Power Logistics with recent case studies. In this guest blog, Tim Benson sets the scene for the discussion on batteries.

Register your free place at #SES23, 18th October, The Showman's Show.

“We have seen some very encouraging engagement in sustainable practices and positive progress with festival organisers reducing their carbon impact this summer. I’m delighted to be sharing some of those experiences and learnings at SES23..." John Rostron, CEO, AIF

For the final #SES panel, John Rostrum, CEO, Association Independent Festivals, introduces guests from UK outdoor festivals who have led the way through the 2023 season with campaigns to reduce the environmental impacts of events. Watch this space for our three panel guests to be announced and register your free place. 

SES 23 is made possible by the support of an amazing range of event partners:

• Title Sponsor: Festival Republic
• Headline sponsors: Arena Group, Events Industry Forum, T&L Marquees, GL Events, LS Events, Pearce Hire and Sunbelt Rentals.
• Panel Sponsors: NCASS, Powerful Thinking, Julie's Bicycle and The Association of Independent Festivals
• Sponsors: Purity Brewing Co., ArrowTown Drinks, 'You.Smart.Thing.', ecolibrium and The Ticketsellers.
• Partners: Event Industry Forum

Finally, special thanks to the team at The Showman's Show for hosting #SES at Newbury Showground for its eighth edition.

In this month’s Green Leader Q&A we hear from Martin Thim Tømmergaard, Partnership & Sustainability manager at DTD Group which runs NorthSide Festival. Martin Thim has a background in music and communication and started Denmark’s first sustainability agency in 2009, it was called WorldPerfect and one of the clients was NorthSide. Martin joined NorthSide in 2019 as Partner & Sustainability Manager. In September 2022 Martin released his first book; “The World Coup”. Read Martin's answers

In July we spoke with Mia Frogner at Øya Festival Read Mia's answers.

Our selected news picks from across the Live Events Industry and beyond, including jobs, blogs, reports, and what the Vision: 2025 team has been watching, listening to, and reading this month:

New waste data recording tools released for Vision: 2025's citizen-science call for Festival Waste Data. Event organisers can get involved & receive the tools HERE

'People & Planet' Access All Areas Autumn Issue - the live events industry's social and environmental sustainability explored HERE 

Carbon Impact Assessment published by A Greener Future HERE

Behind the scenes of Coldplay: Music of the Spheres World Tour - in TPi HERE 

Music Declares Emergency Blog ' Whoops there goes the Festival' HERE 

Our newsletter reaches over 4,000 UK event professionals interested in sustainability. Send jobs, events, resources and articles to feature here to: info@vision2025.org.uk.