Flow Festival invests even more to its sustainability and moves to assess and plan its environmental footprint with a budgeting tool that will be shared with other operators working in the field of event production. The 2025 edition of the festival will have its environmental impact reduced by numerous different factors, including the increase of plant-based dishes and by optimising the use of electricity.

Flow Festival has finished its calculations for the carbon and material footprint for the 2024 edition of the festival. The calculation was executed with the budgeting tool that was developed as part of the Flow Impact research program in collaboration with the future sustainability company D-mat, commenced in 2021 and further developed by Tietoevry.

The results show that Flow Festival’s own carbon footprint was reduced when compared to the previous year, as the festival's carbon footprint was reduced by 2 % to 701 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (t CO2), making it 14 t less than previous year (2023: 715 t CO₂e). At the same time, the material footprint was reduced by 7,5 % to 2,414 t CO2, 196 t less than year before (2023: 2 610 t). Some of the essential reasons resulting in the diminished footprint were the increase of plant-based dishes during the festival, with an increase from 78 % to 83 %, and the decision to rule out typical solutions in festival production, including the decision not to sell merchandise, the more efficient use of resources, and optimisation in the use of spaces in the festival area. The report based on the calculation is available on Flow Festival’s website.

In total, the 2024 carbon and material footprint grew compared to year 2023, as the number of festivalgoers had grown larger than ever before: the total carbon footprint was 2,125 t CO₂e (2023: 1,995 t CO₂e) and material footprint 7,768 t (2023: 7,141 t). The average daily carbon footprint of a member of the audience equals 1,5 days worth of emissions of an average Finn, while the material footprint equals daily average consumption. In future, Fow Festival focuses on taking control of its emissions and use of natural resources by setting strict, measurable targets and methods to acquire its target numbers. With clear, measurable goals and means the festival aims also at influencing also the consumption habits of its festivalgoers, employees, and artists and increasing the synergy between its subcontractors to promote and develop more sustainable solutions.

Key part in budgeting the festival’s natural resources belongs to the budgeting tool for carbon and material footprint, developed together with D-mat, which let’s the user measure and anticipate the possible climate emissions and use of natural resources. Meanwhile, Flow Festival’s mission is to advance sustainability of the whole ecosystem of event production by sharing the budgeting tool for other event organisers to use. For instance, the Finnish festival Ruisrock has used the budgeting tool to measure its own carbon and material footprint for the year 2024.

Environmental impact for Flow Festival’s 2025 edition will be reduced in numerous ways. This includes the restriction for restaurants to use fish originating only from domestic sources. Staff catering will turn completely plant-based, and the overall emissions will be reduced by replacing generators with more efficient planning of electronic connections in the area and with more thorough collaboration with subcontractors. In future, Flow aims at keeping its environmental impact within the boundaries of the 1,5 degrees in accordance with the Paris Climate Agreement.

– No festival operates separately from its environment or the society. That’s why we want to make Flow even more sustainable and share the knowledge based on research about our own impact. First and foremost, we believe that sustainability does not stand for poorer entertainment or additional costs. Instead, we see it as a way of creating a better festival experience for our guests, our artists, and our collaborators, while also regarding it as a sustainable and reasonable way of doing business, Flow Festival’s Managing Director Suvi Kallio says.

One of the biggest contributors to the festival’s emissions are the temporary electricity resolutions that require the use of diesel-based generators. If there would be a permanent electrical grid in the area, the emissions for Flow and other events operating in Suvilahti would decrease radically. Flow Festival wishes that the City of Helsinki would invest in the future to Suvilahti for example in form of the permanent electricity infrastructure.

– Our wish is to develop Suvilahti with the city of Helsinki, so that in future we would be able to utilize permanent infrastructure. This would make the organisation of events in the area even more sustainable, Suvi Kallio says.

Read more about Flow's sustainability report here.