28 November 2019
Massive Attack partner with University of Manchester to explore music industry climate impact
Bristol-based band Massive Attack are partnering with climate scientists at The University of Manchester’s Tyndall Centre to jointly examine the key impact areas of the music industry on the environment.
Massive Attack released a collective statement which said: “For some time, despite taking consistent steps to reduce the environmental impact associated with an internationally touring music group, we’ve been concerned and preoccupied with the carbon footprint of our schedules and the wider impact of our sector overall. This concern has deepened with each new report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and the universal acceptance of the climate & biodiversity emergency."
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Read the whole statement on The Guardian:
'We’ve toured the world for years. To help save the planet we’ll have to change'
Photograph: Babycakes Romero
• This article was written by musician Robert Del Naja on behalf of Massive Attack
The imprinting of climate emergency into the public consciousness, achieved by the school strikes and mass activist arrests, seems to have generated more introspection than positive action. The debate around personal sacrifice, hypocrisy and lifestyle change is playing at high volume and, as recently highlighted by the climate expert Michael Mann, this presents a danger that popular demand for catastrophe-avoiding systemic change could get lost in the mix.
This debate is just as alive (and equally confused) within the music industry. Headline emphasis is often placed on issues such as single-use plastics or band travel by air. Important as those things are, evidence shows that factors such as audience transportation and venue power account for as much as 93% of all the CO2 emissions generated by major music events.
As a band that has toured globally for several years, we’ve had cause to reflect on this. Concerns over our own carbon impact and those of our wider industry aren’t new to us, but the urgency is.
Last year, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change called for “rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society” and said carbon emissions were harmful, regardless of the fun had in their generation. In other words, what goes on tour doesn’t stay on tour.
We’ve taken unilateral steps for nearly two decades – like many bands, we’ve paid to have trees planted, prohibited the use of single-use plastics and travelled by train wherever feasible. We have explored advanced carbon offset models, but in researching these programmes serious issues arose.
First, the concept of offsetting creates an illusion that high-carbon activities enjoyed by wealthier individuals can continue, by transferring the burden of action and sacrifice to others – generally those in the poorer nations in the southern hemisphere. Evidence suggests that offset programmes can wreak serious havoc for the often voiceless indigenous and rural communities who have done the least to create the problem.
Ultimately, carbon offsetting transfers emissions from one place to another rather than reducing them. The European commission has warned that 85% of projects were unlikely to deliver “real” or “measurable” reductions, while the UN environment programme recently stated that offsetting cannot be used by polluters “as a free pass for inaction”.
We’ve also discussed ending touring altogether – an important option that deserves consideration. In reality, however, an entire international roster of acts would need to stop touring to achieve the required impact. In a major employment industry with hundreds of acts, this isn’t about to happen. Any unilateral actions we take now would prove futile unless our industry moves together, and to create systemic change there is no real alternative to collective action.
So today we’re announcing the commissioning of the renowned Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research to map the full carbon footprint of typical tour cycles, and to look specifically at the three key areas where CO2 emissions in our sector are generated: band travel and production, audience transport and venue. The resulting roadmap to decarbonisation will be shared with other touring acts, promoters and festival/venue owners to assist swift and significant emissions reductions.
The stark reality is that failure to do so could mean matters are taken out of our hands. In recent months, (thanks in no small part to those strikes and those arrests) 245 local authorities across the UK have declared a climate emergency, with 149 setting targets of zero emissions by 2030 or earlier. In the festival sector alone, this number includes the licensing authorities for each of the five best-attended UK outdoor events: Glastonbury, Download, Reading/Leeds, V Festivals and Creamfields. Their event plans will now inevitably include mandatory rules on carbon emissions, and so the likelihood of licences being granted without emissions being dramatically and continually reduced is slim.
Given the current polarised social atmosphere, uplifting and unifying cultural events are arguably more important now than ever, and no one would want to see them postponed or even cancelled. The challenge therefore is to avoid more pledges, promises and greenwashing headlines and instead embrace seismic change.
The report produced by the Tyndall Centre will not provide a panacea, and we know implementation of its findings will require significant change for us and our colleagues across the industry who are as keen as we are to create change. But in an emergency context, business as usual – regardless of its nature, high profile or popularity – is unacceptable.
Link to the article: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/28/tour-world-massive-attack-band-climate
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Collaboration on research
The scientists and band will collaborate on a new project to obtain and analyse data from the Massive Attack touring schedule with an aim to providing information and guidance to the wider music industry to reduce negative environmental impact in the midst of the increasing climate emergency.
Dr Chris Jones, Research Fellow at Tyndall Manchester, said: “We will be working with Massive Attack to look at sources of carbon emissions from a band’s touring schedule. Every industry has varying degrees of carbon impact to address and we need partnerships like this one to look at reducing carbon emissions across the board. It's more effective to have a sustained process of emissions reductions across the sector than for individual artists quit live performances. It will likely mean a major shift in how things are done now, involving not just the band but the rest of the business and the audience.”
The band added: “Any unilateral statement or protest we make alone as one band will not make a meaningful difference. In pursuing systemic change, there is no substitute for collective action. In contribution to this action, we’re announcing the commission of the renowned Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at The University of Manchester – a body that brings together scientists, economists, engineers and social scientists to research options to mitigate Global Warming – to map thoroughly the carbon footprint of band tour cycles, and to present options that can be implemented quickly to begin a meaningful reduction of impact.”
The collaboration will produce a framework based on gathered data over Massive Attack’s forthcoming tour based on; band travel and production, audience transportation and venue impact. Following Glastonbury Festival’s commitment to going single use plastic free in 2019 a wider conversation is growing within the industry. It is hoped this academic-led cohesive approach will yield further step change in addressing the current climate and biodiversity crisis.
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Source: the university's website: https://www.manchester.ac.uk/discover/news/massive-attack-partner-with-university-of-manchester-to-explore-music-industry-climate-impact/
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