Sustainability within the screen industry is an increasingly present consideration for UK productions. In this month’s episode of the ScreenSkills podcast, we explored issues across the subject with those at the centre of making decisions that benefit the whole industry.
When it came to filming the second series of the BAFTA-nominated BBC drama, The Responder, embedding practices that had a real impact on the show’s carbon footprint became a vital and early part of the discussions. Producer Barrington Paul Robinson spoke on the podcast with Zen Barry, who leads on decarbonisation at the BBC, about their desire to ensure the production was as sustainable as possible, and how the measures they adopted helped the show achieve a 64% reduction in carbon footprint from the first series.
A re-framing of the thinking has led to how productions are now aiming to improve their record, explained Zen. She said: “It is a conscious switch that we've made this year at the BBC. Historically, productions have always generated their carbon emissions and footprinted them through (industry guidance via) BAFTA Albert. And then they offset their emissions at the very end of the production, which is kind of buying carbon credits to offset the emissions that they've created throughout the production. So, what we're doing now is something called deep decarbonisation of the BBC. And that means to, in simple terms, not create the emissions in the first place.”
For Barrington, the earlier these conversations are had, the better the result for the production. He said: “You've got to be mindful of that from the beginning so it becomes a part of the DNA of every production rather than an additional afterthought or something that we have to add onto the budget. It should already be in the initial plan for the budget.”
Some of the areas they looked at – locations, catering, power sources – all proved to have a sizeable impact on the production’s green credentials, lessons that Barrington is eager to repeat in future projects. “Every meeting I have about the next productions I'm going to do it's probably in the top three of stuff that I talk about. It's really important that it goes into the DNA of the production company that's doing it and all the HoDs that come on board, the actors, the whole lot. The whole lot of it for me has to be buy-in from the beginning. It's as important as the story, or it's more important than the story. It was how we’ve come out of it so we can go back to those locations again and we're not ruining the stuff we're going to have to rely on – the planet – down the road. That's still going to be here longer than those stories.”
"You've got to be mindful of that from the beginning so it becomes a part of the DNA of every production rather than an additional afterthought."
Helping to enact these improvements on productions can fall under the role of sustainability coordinator. Jimmy Keeping, co-founder of Sustainable Film, spoke about what the role entails and how it’s helping the screen industries.
He explained: “It’s to be the eyes and ears of sustainability on a production. It's being able to communicate a sustainability plan across all the different levels of stakeholders and the production. And then ultimately putting all that together with a nice shiny package to be able to deliver to the studio, the broadcaster, the client to sum up what the carbon footprint is of the whole production.”
He and business partner Amelia Price work directly with film and TV productions to implement a sustainability plan; assessing what the potential carbon footprint could be of the production; working with all the different stakeholders, the HoDs, the producers, the production team, to formulate a sustainability plan. This includes everything from locations and waste management to suppliers and technologies used.
Key among these recommendations is the advice and guidance from BAFTA Albert, the organisation’s sustainability arm which provides the industry-standard toolkit for reducing a production’s carbon footprint.
April Sotomayor, Head of Industry Sustainabilty at BAFTA Albert explained: “We're on a mission to reduce the environmental impact of production, but also to use the industry's superpower in storytelling to elevate climate solutions and environmental action across our culture.”
In addition to having a huge existing engagement with productions – 3,000 last year – April spoke about going further still with the formation of Albert’s Sustainable Production Task Force. She said: “It has participants broadcasters, studios, streamers and members that are looking at some key impact areas. And these are energy, how do we reduce the carbon impact of the energy that we use? We use a lot, not just in our buildings, but in our power. So temporary power has been a huge focus and a priority this year. We're also looking at materials and waste. We know to make these incredible elaborate sets, requires a lot of materials in many cases, where do these materials come from? How might we do things differently? Ultimately, where do they end up once sets are struck? So how can we divert, reduce, divert those to be reused? But also how do we reduce how much we're consuming in the first instance?”
Each of the episode’s guests were present at the newly formed Accelerator City event in Liverpool, a UN initiative for climate action under their Entertainment and Culture Climate Action programme. Over the last weekend of November, it saw members from creative industries came together to test and showcase projects for rapid decarbonisation across live music, TV and film productions scheduled in 2025, and invited the public into multiple climate action workshops, live audience podcasts, and performances.
ScreenSkills was at the event to lead a workshop in collaboration with the BFI and BAFTA Albert that gathered over 40 industry sustainability professionals to discuss and establish the requirements for these roles, as an initial stage of the standards development process. They looked at the importance of their involvement all the way through from pre- to post-production phases; the need for high-level communication, resilience, problem-solving, negotiation and influencing skills; and knowledge of local area, power infrastructure, crew and suppliers.
Based on the information gathered on the day, ScreenSkills will run further workshops and discussions through January in collaboration with BAFTA Albert, to complete the development of the national occupational standards for spring 2025, to then act as the basis for further skills checklists and occupational profiles in the following months.
To find out more about sustainability standards or to be involved in their development, contact Krisztina.Biliczky@screenskills.com
For those wanting to learn more about sustainability in the screen industries, there is a ScreenSkills e-learning module co-developed with BAFTA Albert available to complete on the ScreenSkills website. It covers the commitments already made by the screen industries, the challenges and opportunities ahead, key principles of sustainability for the screen industries and the action we can all take in our different roles to support the transformation of the industry.