So I’ve finally landed, I’ve given up the house in Brighton and am to all intents and purposes a nomad, albeit living out of the back of my car which is far from eco as its a 3.2 litre Mercedes Benz. I can’t justify that, it’s just the way it is.

Since creating this website I’ve briefly moved to Ireland, visited N.G. Bailey’s brand new state of the art, energy efficient office block in Glasgow, attended the PLASA show where I had the privilege of being a judge on the Awards for Innovation, attended various seminars on Greening London’s theatres and started my MSC in Architecture: Advanced environmental and energy studies at the Centre for Alternative Technology in Wales.

It’s been a crazy and frenetic time. My week in Wales was fantastic. I met some wonderful people and I am slowly starting to get a more realistic perspective on what I want to say through this website. It’s also made me realize that there is a whole heap of good intentions and rhetoric being bandied about, not just in the entertainment industry but in politics, business and pubs. However when it comes to deciding between short term economic gain and the future of the human race most people sadly choose the former and I do wonder whether this will ever really change.

Words are all well and good and believe me i have listened to a fair few and written a lot more – or should that be the other way around. But for all that, what i have seen an awful lot of is over consumption redefined as green consumption and therefore labeled acceptable. The same product with a different label but still with the same message, this is better so replace what you bought a year ago with me!

Well what about all the embodied energy of the things you already have – which brings me back to my Merc, is it better to get rid of that car and buy a brand new more fuel efficient one or to keep it, be more discerning about when and where i drive it and use public transport as much as humanly possible. A simple dilemma but what I’m driving at is do we really need new green things to replace the things that already exist and if we do replace the things that are no longer considered efficient with more efficient things, how much energy does it take to manufacture and distribute those more efficient things, when will they realistically offset what it takes to make them by their use?

You see it’s not nearly as simple as many might have us believe, and generally speaking the many are those who will make money out of your good intentions to do something positive to combat climate change.

It’s clear then, that this time we cannot buy ourselves a clear conscience, this time we have to think, evaluate and not make knee jerk decisions based on limited information and the desire to be seen to be doing the right thing.

Simple suggestions for the theatre industry. Clean up your act, recycle everything you can, use less water, electricity and gas, insulate buildings, turn the heating down, service your systems, take public transport to work, car share, turn computer and lights off at night, switch your bloody dimmers, amps, consoles off – commonly not done. When you replace your fixtures with new more efficient ones, recycle the old ones any way you can. You can pass them on to other less well off venues and schools or modify lighting to take lower wattage or more efficient lamps – after all the Patt 23 is now a very trendy thing to have chromed and on a stand in ones living room!

Try to cut down on the deliveries you need, forward plan and ask the designers and production team to do the same.

Always look for alternative more efficient ways to do things, I know its often enough just trying to get through the day, but once efficiency is as incorporated at every level into standard practice as Health and Safety then we are on our way.

I realize that theatre is a relatively small contributor to carbon emissions, nevertheless it is one. Theatre can talk to large collectives of people from workers to the managing directors of huge corporations, school children to pensioners, in fact anyone looking for entertainment and a good time. i am not saying theatre should preach but it can teach and it can still be spectacular, fun and entertaining.

I had hoped to report back on the Green Theatre programme at PLASA but I’m going to save that until tomorrow, it’s been a heavy week reporting on the Olympic opening ceremonies in Beijing, the PLASA show and trends in Theatre Lighting for Lighting and Sound International and Lighting and Sound America.

I had also hoped to report on what I learned on the first week of my MSC but that would take up far too much space. I will say that I am very much going to tailor my research to the entertainment industry and plan to publish all research and essays along with my thesis on this website.

Ta ta for now

Sarah

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