Earth Day 2024 at the Lyric Theatre

The theme for Earth Day 2024 is 'Planet vs. Plastics' - with the aim to raise awareness of the harms of plastic pollution for human and planetary health. We have taken the opportunity this Earth Day to reflect on sustainability at the Lyric and our approach to minimizing our adverse environmental affects.

At the Lyric, we are continuously working to ‘Green’ our operations; we promote a culture of sustainability led by our Green Team and Senior Management. So far, our efforts have awarded us:

• The Bronze Green Tourism Award from Belfast City Council and Visit Belfast.
• Shortlisted for a Business in the Community Responsible Business Award for Best Education Partnership for our Eco Schools/ DAERA partnership (May 2022)
• Our work advocating for a creative response to the climate crisis being a key factor in our UK Theatre of the Year Award (The Stage, 2023)
• Shortlisted for a Business in the Community Responsible Business Award for Climate Action Award for our Scenic Construction Workshop (May 2023)

So, how exactly do we minimise our adverse environmental effects?

The Lyric is a purpose built theatre, constructed 13+ years ago with energy efficiency in mind. Since the completion of the building, we have been working to make ourselves even more efficient. We are continuously making improvements to our lighting; using smaller LED lights in our office spaces and actively looking for funding to install LED lights in two of our larger spaces. Each of our spaces are naturally ventilated, with the exception of our two performance spaces. We also installed a new Building Management System, allowing us to more control over heating ventilation and general energy use. This has made hitting our energy saving targets much easier!

We’ve gone paperless in our finance and administration offices, alongside switching our recycling supplier to make sure our waste is managed in the most sustainable way.

Our Scenic Construction team and workshop are at the heart of our efforts to be more green. The Lyric is a full-time producing theatre, creating around 8 in-house productions per year, each with its own world of set and props, greatly maximising the potential for waste. To combat this, we created a new role on the team with sustainability in mind. Our Scenic Construction Manager ensures that the adverse environmental effects of our work is reduced by minimising the use of raw materials in our sets and reusing materials where possible.

The Lyric is also helping to improve our environmental awareness, particularly among young people, through a national schools programme right across Northern Ireland. Our Creative Learning Department has been working with the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) for the last 4 years, bringing theatre to schools across NI. These projects are created with the aim of encouraging the next generation to help protect the environment, focussing on issues like the impact of plastic pollution in Northern Ireland.

In our fourth consecutive year of partnership with DAERA, we were able to deliver 'WasteBusters: The Eco-Musical' by Rebecca Applin to schools across Northern Ireland from January to March 2024. This tour was a second run of the show, first ran in 2023, being brought back due to the remarkable feedback from schools.

Our Green Team meets a minimum of 4 times a year with the goal of getting staff and the wider Lyric community involved in our sustainability efforts.

We believe it's important to keep our audiences updated on the ways we are developing our policies on energy management, waste and sustainability. If you are interested in joining our growing network of arts practitioners across Northern Ireland, Green Arts NI, and sharing best practice please get in touch with development@lyrictheatre.co.uk or visit the Green Arts NI website www.greenartsni.org