One of the current requirements among many is Environmental Sustainability Statements.

Many local government authorities in the UK require such a statement reflecting your show and how you conduct your business together with carbon neutral achievement assessments.

How would you describe the environmental sustainability of your show?

And what steps are you expected to take to achieve carbon neutral status - including your vehicle emissions - during the next five years?

Huhh??? Tony, I know we speak English on both sides of the pond, but I don't have a clue what is meant by environmental sustainability of a show, never mind carbon neutral status. Are they really doing this?

Why not just tell 'em you're going to make all the bad stuff disappear!

All the best,

Rob

Rob,

I do know that a burned grilled cheese sandwich is called a carbon sandwich. Does that help?

Bubba in Alabama

One of the many requirements made by local government authorities (councils) of any company or individual wishing to supply products or services is a Enviromental Sustainability Statement.

the objective is the running of your business in a proven enviromentally friendly and sustainable manner. You have to list all activities and indicate how you manage these in an enviromentally friendly and sustainable manner.

How do you fulfill these criteria in North America?

I must admit I don't know what Tony is referring to either. I have never come across this concern in my kids performances. Is this just a UK issue?

Cap'n Mike
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Posted: Feb 7, 2007 7:46pm
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I was posting while you were posting ... I am not aware that we here in the U.S. of A. have these criteria to meet. Can someone else help provide further insight?

Cap'n Mike
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No. It's European and worldwide. It's the protection of the environment for future generations.

Take your car as a part of your business. It emits pollutants. How do you propose to manage this?

You can't say it's nothing you can deal with. You have to or they will close you down eventually.

The UK government is currently proposing a tax on driving between £1 and £2 per mile - you buy a £200 meter which is satellite monitored and every mile is clocked and you are billed monthly.

We're fighting this move but it looks like it will go ahead just as tolls to get into London have gone ahead. £5 to start with, now £10 and soon £20 and that's per day, just to get to work.

Answer, don't use your car.

Ok? Take it from there please.

Wow - that sounds wack !! Charging for every mile and making you buy the meter that records it (or are they going to provide that for you?). Yeah, fight it all the way. Hey, I'm all in favor of doing what one can to help the environment yet this sounds extreme. This is the first I've heard of this over-seas proposal.

Best of luck,
Cap'n Mike
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Dude,
Time to move to free country. Or work to make yours free. Environmental sustainability...jiminy crickets!

Man, Tony...No wonder we Colonies broke away from ya'll. Sounds to me like the Stamp Act all over again! I was shocked when I heard that Canada has a special chocolate tax. If Wasington ever tried to tax us a buck or two per mile...they'd have to hunt for the Congressmen and Senators with fishing nets and a trawler! Good lord!

I believe a lot of this has come to light since the recent award winning Al Gore documentary, and the earlier Art Bell, Whitley Streeber movie. Global warming is still a hot topic in political circles. However, if you were to read the first chapter of Jurassic Park, I think you would get a totally different perspective. Also, check out the current temperature in the North East, and I think the end of time is more likely to arrive through another ice age, than through frying an egg on the side walk! This is why we come back to 27. It makes sense to me. I would be delighted to hear what others rate the dangers of all this affecting their performance?

Let me try a serious response to this...

We don't have this kind of legislation over here in the US for small businesses yet, but the large ones (manufacturing, etc.) do have to deal with how they pollute and how they are being responsible about it. It sounds like the UK has decided to make all businesses look at what they do, with the goal of reducing pollution everywhere.

Start here: Imagine you were a catering company that cooked food and then transported it to an event...How are you cooking the food? Are you disposing of the grease, etc properly? How many miles do your catering trucks drive each year? Are they regular engines or diesel? How many pounds of pollutants do they put out each year? Etc etc. Eventually you'd have an estimate of how you impact things, and could make some changes to fix them.

So, for us magicians, it should be a much simpler task. You need to analyze your show and see what's in it. Off the top of my head:

- Car, emits pollutants. No way around this. You can buy carbon offsets from various firms based on your mileage accumulated annually. This puts money into tree planting, etc to offset all the foliage that gets cut down on a daily basis. See this Wikipedia entry for background:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_offset

- Electricity used by your home office (computer, lights, etc.). Also can buy carbon offsets.

- Anything in your show that could be considered impactful. Do you use balloons? Then natural latex, which should be biodegradable, would be an appropriate choice.

I doubt any of us here eat fire, but those guys will have to deal with the burning kerosene issue, if only to make the officials feel OK.

You get the idea. Since in this case, we're providing a service that uses a set of props over and over, the list of things that actually have an environmental impact will be pretty small. I think once you work out what to do to fill out this form, then filing it again will be pretty simple.

Jeff

Denying global warming is like saying smoking is not harmful. Over 2000 scientists worldwide have once again declared that global warming is indeed a fact, they have backed this up with reams of evidence that point to human activity in causing the warming, about 98% of scientists studying climate agree global warming is happening, if people don't get it now, they never will, and the planet will just go ecocide thanks to our continued unsustainable mass consumptive global society.

I got rid of my car last month. For my birthday parties, I take a bus when I can, and sometimes rent a car when necessary, or take a taxi. I will also be using my bicycle when the weather is warmer. I'm planning to present myself as some kind of eco-mage.

Meanwhile, this is a very good time to put together a school magic show on environmentalism.

First off Jurassic Park is Science Fiction with a major emphasis on the fiction part. Second the chapter in question describes how this planet has always been hospitable for life. At least after it cooled and created an atmosphere. What people fail to comprehend when they read this chapter however is that yes, life is and has for a very long time been quite prevalent on this planet. It just hasn't nor will it always be us.

If it has been there for a million years, Payne, my guess is it will be there for another million years. Granted, life may be a little different then. The question I must ask is in 27 million years hence, will we all still be doing Run Rabbit Run?

What you haven't mentioned, Tony, is the reality of what happens in reality as opposed to what all the documents would have us believe. For instance, take recycling: many councils now insist that we separate our garbage into paper, plastic, glass, etc, so that it can be recycled. So householders dutifully do this, a vast amount of money is spent to have special vans collect and sort the garbage properly. This is then taken.....to the nearest landfill and dumped along with all the other trash. Reason? The recycling companies are paid more for taking more garbage, but they're allowed to send non-recyclable garbage to the landfills. No one actually checks that what they send to the landfills is what they claim, so they just send the majority of the garbage unsorted.
Another example: cruise ships (especially the top cruise lines) like to advertise how environmentally friendly they are. Yet they burn a gallon of fuel every 15 inches, and despite an international ban on dumping garbage at sea, as soon as the garbage room gets full (usually takes about 3-4hours after leaving port), excess garbage is routinely dumped overboard in the middle of the night.
Still as far as the council (or whatever regulatory body is "responsible") is concerned, all is fine, because ON PAPER it says that these things don't happen.
This is just as well for the councils, for when future generations suffer because of the selfish behaviour of modern man, the councils won't be to blame. Or will they?

If life is good it's so easy to ignore possible consequences. I guess we owe much to the scientists who have been taking measurents for a long time now. We now have a choice to save ourselves.

Kevin

ps Love the sound of your show! snot one to miss.

Children care far more about the environment than adults, and that's a fact!
Todsky, your idea of getting rid of the car could easily be a big selling point! I can envisage a brightly coloured bicycle with all horns and bells and shiny things to press. It would have a locking stand arrangement to hold the bike upright, and the quick release saddle could be instantly replaced with a table top. Voila! Your very own, eco-friendly touring magic show! This would easily get noticed by the media, and you'd get loads, I mean LOADS of free publicity, thus reducing your paper consumption and further enhancing your status as eco-friendly! In addition to all that, you even get to keep yourself super fit, cycling around your neighbourhood! Boy, that is one GREAT idea!

I was required to supply a Statement to a local council in December - my contract depending on it. I muffed my way through but what we are being asked to address are currently difficult areas because we in turn have never addressed the problemss.

I don't know what materials a supplier of magic props has used. but I'm going to have to know where for example his timber came from and I shall be expected to know the sustainable forest policy certifcate details. His supplier will have to provide him with the information and he will need to tell me.

Questions auch as whether the paint used is water based (acceptable) or volitile spirit (not acceptable). Is the sheet material plastic (not acceptable) or timber (acceptable with a source certificate reference).

For example, when I work on hard standing I need a broom or brush to sweep up between audiences. I saw last week at a wholesaler brooms with polka dot handles. Yes the stales are timber but could they give me proof of where it came from? No, What's more they had hundreds of 'school brushes' the local authority refused to buy because the company couldn't show where the timber came from, if it was from managed sources.

All these Statements are in addition to those we've had to provide for years such as Electricity Test certificates for any electrical apparatus, Detailed Risk Assessments which look at every aspect of your show, highlight the hazards and risks and supply details of how you take account of these hazards and risks and negate them.

I'd love to come up with a green magic act. There is a socialist conjuror here who did very well in the 80s with things like the class war rope trick (professor's nightmare - three ropes represent different classes engaged in class struggle). He's still around but hard left audiences are probably harder to come by.

Scientific Fact: The air and water around us is cleaner today than it was just three decades ago. Global warming is an unproven scientific theory at best. The scientists (and their companies and foundations) touting this hypothesis as irrefutable scientific fact rely on government grants and liberal donations to continue their lofty lifestyles. They, along with the whorish media structure, will continue to push the party line...whatever that line may be...in order to secure and remain in power. Fear and greed are the currency petty minded bureaucrats use to buy influence and votes...and so many of us follow along blindly like mind-numbed sheep. Managing our resources and protecting our environment are wonderful things...but enforcing environmental impact legislation against a magic or puppet show? Giving a tinker's dang about the environmental impact of a broom handle at the consumer's level? Who comes up with this crap and why do we, as a "free" people stand for it? No emotion here...just hard, plain spoken, logical fact.