onboard:earth and Humanitix partner to restore ecosystems through live event ticket sales
Humanitix has become the first ticket agency in the UK to offer a climate donation as a standard part of the checkout process. Working in partnership with the charity onboard:earth, the Climate Levy Donation gives event attendees a simple way to directly address the environmental impacts associated with travel to events. Event organisers can join a free live webinar to explore how they can get involved, October 15th, 12:00-13:00. Register here: https://events.humanitix.com/climate-levy-webinar
Audiences are increasingly becoming more concerned about their impact on the planet, especially as travel to live events typically causes 60-80% of the total carbon footprint. The option to add a Climate Levy Donation to each ticket gives event hosts an easy way to make a difference and engage the whole audience in protecting the planet.
Humanitix has made the process of adding the Climate Levy to their event set-up straightforward, with a range of donation amounts suggested according to the scale of the event. Event hosts can unite their audiences to take action and demonstrate their own values by sending a clear message: protecting our planet is not optional. When every guest contributes, the collective action adds up to real, measurable impact.
onboard:earth’s project director, Sarah Moore, comments:
“Humanitix has developed an impactful pathway to help live events protect and restore our natural world with the Climate Levy; helping event hosts to make it standard practice so that the environmental impacts of event travel are addressed at point of purchase. At onboard:earth, we are excited about helping events to share the positive impacts for communities, forests and seas, thanks to these collective donations.”
Every Climate Levy Donation is channelled to onboard:earth’s Canopy and Coast program, funding high‑impact environmental restoration and climate justice projects around the world: preserving threatened rainforest, restoring marine ecosystems on the UK coastline, planting trees in areas of the world hardest hit by climate change and in the UK through local community planting projects.
Event hosts can view their own impact metrics on the Humanitix platform, making it easy to report with confidence to their audience on the number of trees planted, acres of rainforest protected and areas of marine ecosystem restored after every event. Plus, the human stories about the communities leading these projects, provide powerful content to share with audiences throughout the year.
The UK general manager at Humanitix, Harry Cole, comments:
“onboard:earth’s mission aligns directly with Humanitix’s belief that events can be an incredible catalyst for social change, and that includes climate action. We are delighted to be offering the Climate Levy to amplify impact for nature restoration.”
Join the Humanitix and onboard:earth Climate Levy webinar to find out more: https://events.humanitix.com/climate-levy-webinar
onboard:earth launches Green Travel Toolkit to decarbonise welsh event travel
The environmental charity onboard:earth has launched its Green Travel Toolkit for Events in Wales at the Welsh Festivals Summit in Cardiff, aimed at helping event organisers to measure and reduce the carbon footprint associated with attendee and production travel.
The new special-edition guide and toolkit was funded by the Event Wales Sustainable Events Accelerator project. Chris Johnson, CEO of onboard:earth, shared the resources with delegates at the Summit, which was presented by the Association of Independent Festivals (AIF) and the British Arts Festivals Association (BAFA).
The Green Travel Toolkit is designed to help organisations measure and reduce travel impacts based on recent research and best-practice strategies. It provides two main guides: The Green Travel Guide for Welsh Events, and A Quick Guide to Collecting Quality Travel Data.
In addition to the guides, the toolkit includes practical resources, including; spreadsheets for accurately recording and understanding vehicle miles and emissions; off-the-shelf surveys to collect quality travel data from event stakeholders, policy templates to formalise commitments with stakeholders; and action plans ready to be deployed by event teams.
The main guide summarises key findings from Welsh and UK Government policy reports, detailing how upcoming changes may affect event organisers. This includes insights from the Welsh Government's policy document, ‘Decarbonising Wales Transport System while connecting people and places’ (March 2024), alongside updates on Welsh Public Transport Infrastructure.
New case studies in the guide showcase successful low-carbon initiatives implemented across a variety of Welsh events, spanning music festivals, mass participation sporting events, and venues. These examples include Hay Festival, Green Man Festival, Ourea Events, Live Nation’s Chepstow Summer Sessions, Run4Wales’ Cardiff Half Marathon, and The International Conference Centre Wales.
These successes demonstrate that tackling travel challenges is achievable and often requires partnership working. They illustrate how events are successfully collaborating directly with transport providers like Transport for Wales, First Bus, and Great Western Railway to make low-carbon travel more accessible for audiences.
Lucy Scrase, project manager at onboard:earth and Green Travel Toolkit lead, said:
“Thanks to funding from the Welsh Government's Event Wales Sector Development Fund, and the policy insights and knowledge shared by our partners, we’ve been able to tailor our best-practice tools and advice on green travel and transport to support events in Wales. We hope this guide charts a clear, actionable path for the continual rise of low-carbon event travel across the country.”
Green Events Code of Practice updated to drive clear and bold sector commitments and targets
The national Green Events Code of Practice (GECoP) has been updated to provide a clear, robust, and nationally consistent framework for event organisers, local authorities, and the supply chain. The revised code reflects current best practices and aligns with national policy, aiming to help the UK live events sector achieve ambitious environmental targets.
The GECoP is published by Vision for Sustainable Events, with the review chaired by LIVE Green. It was supported by a working group that included event sustainability experts—specifically A Greener Future, Creative Zero, and Hope Solutions—as well as event promoters Festival Republic and AEG.
Following a successful 2024 pilot with 10 local authorities focused on integrating the code into their processes, the updated GECoP will be adopted by more than 20 UK cities in 2025. This expansion is the next step toward a national roll-out, ultimately aiming to provide an off-the-shelf framework and baseline for nationally consistent event assessment.
Chris Johnson, chair of the Vision for Sustainable Events Forum, comments:
“Fundamentally, the Green Code aims to answer the question, ‘What does good look like?’ This refresh brings the code up to date, providing clarity for the sector on best practice and on the action we need to take to achieve meaningful reductions in the environmental impacts of events.”
GECoP is intended to establish a common understanding of best practice, offering clear and robust minimum standards that can be assessed to achieve national consistency. The updated code articulates the sector’s continued commitment to achieving a 50% reduction in emissions by 2030. It also emphasises the industry’s role as a driver of wider societal change.
Targets for energy have been strengthened in this second version, now including a 100% reduction in onsite fossil fuel consumption at live events by 2030. This aligns with wider creative, TV, and film industry commitments. HVO fuel is acknowledged as a transitional bridge where electric or green hydrogen solutions cannot yet meet power needs.