Audi Belgium contributes to a greener Paradise City with renewable energy floors
Audi, the international luxury car manufacturer is actualising its agenda to become more sustainable. In summer 2021, the brand with the four rings partnered with Paradise City, the Belgian eco-festival, to bring renewable energy to the festival site through our Sustainable Dance Floor.
The global event industry is believed to be a trillion-dollar market, with summer festivals contributing to a significant amount of that share. In Europe alone it was estimated that the festival industry would be worth 4.1 billion euros in 2020. With these growing figures in mind, what does this mean for the environment?
At Glastonbury, one of the world’s most popular music festivals, the consequences of this can already be seen. Every five years, the event organisers factor in a ‘fallow year’ meaning that no festival takes place in order to let the land, wildlife and locals recover. More solutions, including creative ones have sprung up to troubleshoot the burden that this industry has on the impact of our eco-system.
Greener festivals
Paradise City is an annual festival held in Perk, Belgium. In 2019 it featured in the top 6 most sustainable festivals in the world, according to A Greener Festival – an NGO dedicated to improving sustainability of events and festivals. For Paradise City, in every step of the process, thought is given to how the ecological impact can be reduced to the absolute minimum. Some of their solutions include recycling camping equipment, encouraging the use of public transport, minimising plastic bottles, and, this year, banning the sale of cigarettes to reduce the littering of butts.
Most notably however, the festival is powered by renewable energy. This summer, the event agency DDMC asked us to integrate our Energy Floors in the creation of a sustainable booth for Audi Belgium on the Paradise City Festival ground.
Audi Belgium’s sustainable agenda
Sustainability is a top priority at Audi. Their aim is to have entirely carbon-neutral operations by 2050. They are also investing heavily in recycling by saving raw materials and energy, for example, in the Audi A3, recycled PET bottles are used in the seat upholstery.
Their sustainability activities are not limited to their own production processes and products. In fact, there is a conscious search for projects where Audi can help achieve its sustainable goals. As such, Audi Belgium’s partnership with Paradise City is well matched.
“Contributing to a more sustainable world, by focusing on progress, innovation and adaptability. As partners, Audi and Paradise City share the same mission”, explains Stef Sleurs, Marketing Manager at Audi.
This year the brand installed our interactive Sustainable Dance Floor as part of the brand activation campaign at the #etronstage – named after their fully electric SUV, the Audi e-tron. The floor generated energy which was transformed into electricity when festival visitors dance on it. Not only did the floor contribute to the overall energy production to the festival, but dancers were able to participate in an energy dance battle, striking the balance between entertainment, sustainability and an awareness of consumption.
