Pop Culture

The Greening of Bonnaroo

Bonaroo, the widely popular week-long music festival held in Nashville, Tennessee has recently pledged to devote considerable “monetary investment” to turn the event green.

Held each summer, the concert attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors and this year featured some of the hottest acts in music, including Radiohead, Death Cab for Cutie, Tom Petty, and many more.

Realizing the heavy footprint so many people in one spot can have, the Bonaroo organizers have decided to act locally and hope for global change. They have vowed “to educate our attendees and bring Global Warming and other environmental issues into the mainstream.” Additionally, concert planners have created Planet Roo, the onsite footprint at Bonnaroo which features environmentally / socially responsible organizations, organic food and beverage brands, a green cafÈ, a solar powered stage, yoga / dance classes, speakers and more. ‘Green Tags’ are sold in Planet Roo giving attendees the opportunity to offset emissions from their trip to Bonnaroo.

For more information: www.bonnaroo.com

The Dave Matthews Band: Under the Table and Dreaming of Carbon Neutrality

The Dave Matthews Band has been playing great music for years. An energetic live performance combined with a truly unique sound has made for countless unforgettable nights throughout the world. But with each show comes a slew of carbon dioxide emissions produced by transporting everything from stage lighting to instruments to Dave and the band members themselves from venue to venue.
Perhaps even better sounding than their music (at least to us at Shift…) was the band’s announcement on June 27, 2006 that they were officially going carbon neutral. By offsetting all of the carbon emissions they have produced by touring since 1991, DMB intends to take a firm stance on global warming.
In partnering up with NativeEnergy, the band will financially aid in the building of new clean energy sources to replace fossil fuel burning power plants throughout America. In fact, you don’t have to be a wildly successful musical group to offset your CO2 emissions. Anyone can visit www.nativeenergy.com to learn more about the process and take an active role in eliminating global warming.

For more information: www.dmband.com



Pearl Jam Takes On Global Warming

Following in the (light) footsteps of Dave Matthews Band, Coldplay, and other responsible rock groups (have those words ever been written in the same sentence?), Pearl Jam has decided to do its part to offset global warming by lowering its carbon output.

In its Carbon Portfolio Strategy, the band explains that it will “donate a total of $100,000 to nine organizations doing innovative work around climate change, renewable energy, and the environment.” The organizations include the American Solar Energy Society, the Cascade Land Conservancy, EarthCorps, and more.

"We hope that by highlighting and creating a commons for these groups, we can advance preservation of existing ecosystems, restoration of degraded environments, and continued investment in clean, renewable energy technologies. Furthermore, by working with these groups and others to mitigate our own carbon emissions, we ultimately hope to get Pearl Jam at 0% net emissions for our tours and businesses,” the band writes on their website.

Long advocates for social and environmental change, in 2003 the band joined forces with Conservation International to offset 5,700 tons of CO2 emissions released from trucks, buses, airplane travel, hotel rooms, concert venues — and the estimated one million fans driving to and from the concerts — by creating and managing a new protected area in the rainforest of Makira, Madagascar. They also pledged $100,000 to organizations working on climate change and renewable energy in the northwestern United States, near the band's Seattle home.

For more information: www.pearljam.com/activism/carbon.php

Down Shift articles were written by Tiffany Coe, Jeremy Lubin, Christine Ra, Jason Rissman, and Aaron Kenedi

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