Evaluating Sustainability at Event Venues

Two of the largest contributors to an event’s carbon footprint is travel followed by food and beverage. One of the largest components that affects both of these factors is your venue.

So in order to reduce the environmental impact of your event, what should we be looking for in a venue?

First and foremost, where are most of your event attendees coming from? Is it Toronto? Los Angeles? London? Sydney?

To reduce both the number of flights and flight travel distances, you want to select the geographical location closest to your guests.

Once you’ve selected the geographic location and city, you must consider the list of requirements such as capacity, number of rooms and spaces, proximity to hotels (if not hosting at one) that you’re looking for as a planner.

From there, the first place to look is on the venue’s website. Do they have any sustainability policies, if yes, what are they? (And if you own or work for a venue,

If there is little to no information on a space’s sustainability practices, here are some considerations and question to ask:

1. Is the venue accessible by multiple modes of transportation? i.e. can attendees walk, bike or take public transportation from their hotel or place of residence?

You can easily check this using a tool like Walkscore or use Google Maps to determine distances between your venue and hotel (if separate).

2. Is the building LEED certified? Or for hotels, Green Key Global? If no certifications, does the venue space have any energy efficiencies such as LED lights, low flush toilets or energy star certified appliances? Could you partner with Bullfrog Power?

You want to determine if the physical building itself has any energy saving practices or energy efficient appliances that can help reduce the carbon footprint of your event.

3. What sort of waste management is on-site, do they have organics, recycling and garbage bins?

To support what sort of items can be purchased and where they are disposed of is dependent upon the type of bins available on-site. And further to that, determining what is actually accepted into each bin. Remember recycling varies from place to place.

To make your planning process earlier, go ahead and grab my FREE Venue Sustainability Checklist. Because after evaluating your venue, you’re able to make the best selection for your client that’s in alignment with their eco-values while simultaneously reducing your event’s carbon footprint!