A new peer-reviewed paper is challenging the live music industry to reconsider the environmental viability of “mega festivals,” arguing that the current trajectory of continuous growth is fundamentally incompatible with climate goals. Published in the journal Event Management, the research posits that licensing bodies must move beyond incremental operational improvements and consider radical structural changes, including capping audience numbers.
The paper, co-authored by independent researcher Dr. Adrian Bossey, Dr. Mike Duignan of the Centre for Events and Festivals, and Dr. Teresa Moore of the sustainability body A Greener Future, frames “festival gigantism” as the primary obstacle to true sustainability in the sector. The authors argue that while festivals have increasingly adopted “green” initiatives—such as improved waste management and renewable generators—these measures are failing to keep pace with the massive expansion in capacity seen over the last decade.
“Polishing operations while expanding capacity is not a sustainability strategy; it is a contradiction,” the authors state. “The evidence is unambiguous: absolute environmental burdens continue to rise because scale outpaces efficiency.”
The study highlights major events such as Glastonbury and Download as examples of festivals that have scaled up to become “mega events,” noting that even the most well-intentioned sustainability efforts are rendered ineffective by the sheer volume of attendees. According to the research, the single largest contributor to a festival’s carbon footprint is audience travel—a factor that scales linearly with capacity and the internationalization of lineups. The authors contend that operational tweaks cannot mitigate the emissions generated when hundreds of thousands of people travel to greenfield sites, often in areas with limited public transport infrastructure.
To address this, the paper proposes a series of policy interventions. Central to these recommendations is the suggestion that local authorities should mandate carbon budgets as a “condition of licensing” for large-scale events. Furthermore, the authors call for mandatory travel demand management policies to force a shift away from private vehicle usage. Most controversially, the study advocates for “degrowth”—a conscious decision to reduce absolute audience capacity at the industry’s largest festivals.
“Festivals have grown too big, too fast, with too few guardrails to stop profit trumping planet,” said Dr. Mike Duignan. The authors argue that the sector is currently attempting to “offset or efficiency-measure its way out of a structural growth problem,” a method they describe as fundamentally flawed in the face of a climate emergency.
The call for capacity caps comes at a time when the demand for major live music events remains at an all-time high. Glastonbury, for instance, recently sold out its first batch of tickets within 30 minutes, underscoring the commercial pressure to maintain and grow event sizes. However, the researchers emphasize that the industry must eventually confront a binary choice: prioritizing long-term environmental value over short-term volume.
“Whilst this will be contentious, we believe that the sector must choose: value over volume, or business as usual in the face of a climate emergency,” Dr. Adrian Bossey noted.
By framing sustainability as a matter of explicit governance rather than voluntary industry effort, the authors hope to provoke a much-needed discussion among policymakers, festival organizers, and stakeholders. As climate targets tighten globally, the research serves as a stark warning that the status quo of ever-expanding festival footprints is increasingly difficult to justify. Whether local governments will be willing to impose capacity limits on culturally and economically significant events remains a point of intense debate, but the paper insists that without such guardrails, the music industry’s environmental goals will remain out of reach.
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