Earlier this year, Sunshine Coast Council learnt that one of the bands from the 80+ performers at Caloundra Music Festival were making waves – energy waves.
Regurgitator, is one of many touring bands and artists to join Future Energy Artists (FEAT), a world-first initiative for artists to build and invest in their own solar farms.
Sunshine Coast Division 2 Councillor Tim Dwyer said this was a great initiative for the music industry to embark on.
"Sunshine Coast Council is already generating renewable energy and significant cost savings from our very own Sunshine Coast Solar Farm at Valdora, so it's wonderful to see more people and industries supporting renewable energy," said Cr Dwyer.
"Like these musicians, our own Caloundra Music Festival team – both staff and volunteers – have committed to working towards a number of environmental and sustainability measures, and have been for some time."
In 2013, Caloundra Music Festival set out to be the first Australian festival to eliminate the single-use plastic water bottle. The festival introduced the #BYOBottle campaign and had overwhelming success with the initiative.
The #BYOBottle campaign is still going strong with festival goers now familiar with the concept.
Festival director Richie Eyles said CMF continued to ask all festival-goers, crew and artists to bring a re-usable water bottle to the festival.
"It's easy to get fresh, clean water with multiple free refill stations across the festival site," Mr Eyles said.
"Festival goers can also buy reusable cups and save us using plastic ones in our food and beverage areas."
Caloundra Music Festival is continually looking for new ways to increase its sustainability credentials.
This year the event is striving to reduce even more waste by separating cardboard, aluminium cans, soft plastics and organics which will significantly reuce the amount of waste going to landfill.
These new initiatives for 2019, align with both Queensland's new container refund scheme and council's commitment to phase out single-use plastics at council run events.
Council encourages festival-goers to follow Regurgitator's sustainable footsteps, to keep the CMF site clean and green by making conscious decisions about how they dispose of their rubbish.
Regurgitator will play Sunday 5 October, from 5.15pm. To buy tickets and show your support go to www.caloundramusicfestival.com.
The Caloundra Music Festival is an event initiative of Sunshine Coast Council and supported by the Queensland Government through Tourism and Events Queensland, and features on the It's Live! in Queensland events calendar, worth $800m to the state's economy in 2019.
Green initiatives:
Education
Partnerships with environmental groups to promote environmental messages, run fun interactive educational activities and raise funds. This year we are offering TurtleCare and BushCare programs in the Funky Forest to help teach kids about about our local beaches, how patrons can help to conserve marine turtle nesting habitat and they can screen print their very own reusable, calico bag.
Energy
- LED stage and back-of-house lightning
- Use of solar lights in and around the festival site
Transport
- Valet bike parking
- Park and ride – the shuttle bus is well used, with additional new pick up point from Stockland shopping centre this year.
- Caloundra Music Festival runs a hybrid electric vehicle throughout the year
Reuse/Recycle/Repurpose
- Corflute festival signage is reused each year
- Reusable cups at the bars
- Can collection – we are continuing to swap beverages in glass or plastic items in favour of aluminium cans.Aluminium is 100% recyclable, can be recycled indefinitely and is easier and more energy efficient to recycle than glass.
Waste
- Waste separation for cardboard, recycling, organics and waste, plus clear plastics from back of house areas
- 32 Waste Warriors will volunteer approximately 476 hour dedicated to litter-picking and waste separation
- Vendors are required to use compostable cutlery and plates
