Purpose
The purpose of this statement is to outline our commitment to environmental sustainability. Although a small arts organisation, Kirkstall Art Trail is aware that operations may still contribute to the ongoing climate emergency.
We continue to work towards building on our environmental commitment, and are committed to reducing the environmental impact of our organisation. We are members of SAIL (Sustainable Arts In Leeds), who support the creative and cultural industries to be environmentally sustainable.
Travel and transport
- Committee members, volunteers, and commissioned artists are encouraged to consider travel options which minimise carbon emissions such as walking, public transport, cycling, or car-pooling if the use of a car is unavoidable.
- Our meetings are held locally and within walking distance of most members. However, if possible and appropriate, video conferencing is considered as an alternative to travelling to a meeting from members who are not local and live a distance away.
- Exhibitors and workshop facilitators are encouraged to consider travel options which minimise carbon emissions such as walking, public transport, cycling, or car-pooling if the use of a car is unavoidable. This is communicated in the acceptance mail, and through FAQ.
- Visitors are encouraged to make sustainable travel choices when visiting the trail. This is emphasised by providing clear information about green travel on the website and social media (e.g. bus routes and timetables and cycling routes).
Materials and Waste
- We use the three ‘Rs’ when we think about our relationship to materials and consumption. Reduce, reuse, recycle.
- We have implemented a materials inventory. This enables us to keep a track of what we have, what we use, and what and how we discard materials.
- We aim to carefully consider the materials and methods we use:
- purchasing recycled materials where possible
- reusing and upcycling existing materials
- repurposing materials from donations, charity shops, Scrap (who are based in Leeds and sell discarded materials, originally destined for landfill), etc.
- by sourcing from environmentally responsible and local suppliers as much as possible. We can do this by seeing their own environmental policies.
- When sourcing new materials we assess their sustainability in advance so that they can be used for future events.
- Printing is kept to a minimum and correspondence is sent electronically where possible.
- Where materials cannot be reused, they are recycled.
- We aim to provide guidelines for participating artists on the Art Trail’s environmental policy, encouraging the use of sustainable materials and practices.
- We will make use of a Circular Network, where we can and it is possible, before buying new. We will also use this to rehome what we can no longer make use of.
Programme of Events
- We aim to include in Kirkstall Art Trail, events and exhibitions that creatively engage with environmental issues.
- We aim to consider both the short and long term environmental effects of our projects. We aim for them to have a lasting positive impact both physically and through public engagement.
- We will write green guidelines into contracts for future project work.
- Due to the variety of the venues that we use, it is difficult to guarantee that they can or do consider their environmental impact. We check if a venue has an ‘Environmental Sustainability Policy’ but this is not always possible.
- We will include our environmental commitment in Venue Packs.
Digital Impact
We are aware the impact that internet has on the consumption of electricity and the resultant carbon emissions. To this point we have considered how our website has a part in this.
- We use Fasthosts, which is a UK based green cloud storage and web hosting company.
- We use WordPress, who are the most ethical Content Management System. It’s free, open source and they’ve made commitments to sustainable change.
- We use a light theme across the website. Some evidence has shown that users are less likley to turn up the brightness than when in dark mode. Increasing screen brightness uses more power. However, we cannot control for users device settings, using dark mode, or turning up the screen brightness.
- We consider the media we use. We do not include media unless it adds value. We optimise media so it is appropriately sized. We save images in web friendly formats such as webP. We have disabled the auto-play function on media. We do not use decorative animation.
- We will consider all the points raised in the web sustainability guidelines to help us build a low energy website. We do, however, have to work with restrictions of cost and feasibility, as a volunteer-led organisation.
- You, the user, can also help to reduce the energy consumed whilst viewing this website. Use a smaller device where possible, turn down the brightness, and keep your old devices for longer, which helps to reduce the number of new devices that need to be manufactured.
Communications
- We aim to advocate positive environmental practices and policies across all areas of our work.
- We aim to promote local green initiatives through our programme, newsletter and social media.
- We aim to create opportunities for environmental and climate related creative projects.
- Our aim is that all committee members have an understanding of the importance of environmental issues, with preference for having a board member in place who is actively involved in this area.
Monitoring and reviewing
We monitor our commitments and aims as we work. We review this statement yearly, or earlier if required.
Review
The policy was last reviewed on 20 April 2026