Two men enjoy an intimate moment at the environmentally friendly BILF. Photo: Courtesy of Bookworm

By Chris Hawke

This year's Bookworm International Literary Festival (BILF) has declared itself carbon neutral, taking steps ranging from investing in a hydroelectric project in Sichuan to changing the drinking habits of festival goers.

"We are not selling or giving away water in plastic bottles," Bookworm owner Alexandra Pearson told Lifestyle. "We are only using water from the large water containers," reducing consumption from about 15 bottles a day to zero.

Clutching at straws

A surprising saving involved drinking straws; during the festival, they have only been given out on request. "Consumption has gone from 150 to 12 a day."

The Bookworm found an auditor to tally up how much carbon would be generated by the festival. Working with Climate Action, one of many businesses trying to develop a voluntary market for individuals, organizations and corporations to invest directly in green power projects, the bookstore took steps such as installing heat-sensing water systems in the switching to energy-efficient light bulbs bathrooms and turning off fridges in the kitchen and bar at night.

According to the audit, over half the festival's emissions stem from flights. Because meeting the authors is the point of the festival, these (and others, generated by shipments like sponsor-donated Australian wine) are considered unavoidable. To offset them, the Bookworm is investing in a small hydroelectric plant in Shujing, Sichuan province, to help promote carbon-emissions-free green power sources, which will reduce the need for the dirty coal power plants that supply most of China's energy.

Jen Niven, a key festival organizer, told Lifestyle before she left the Bookworm to work in Australia that she knows this approach [carbon offsetting] is controversial, but hopes it will serve as a launching pad for further discussion on the issue.

Plant a story

The investment in the power plants was facilitated by Climate Action's cofounder and director Justin Barrow, who believes that once this market is robustly developed, green projects will be just as profitable as inexpensive coal plants, and investors will pour money into funding them.

Jenny Chu, organizer of the monthly Green Drinks event at the Bookworm that brings together people interested in the environment to socialize and network, applauded the Bookworm's effort to hold a carbon-neutral festival, nothing that there is a growing trend of events in China becoming carbon neutral.

"I think it's a great awareness-raising activity," she said, emphasizing that internal measures are the most important. "The market mechanism [of carbon offsetting] is helpful," she says, but it should be "the last step."

Pearson herself sees the festival as a stepping-stone to the Bookworm becoming a fully carbon-neutral business, but says that day is some time off. "There are different aspects to being carbon neutral, and offsetting is just one of them, and in a way the easiest," Pearson said. "Other steps require changes to the venue and ways of operating, and these of course require investment in time and money."