The interview was conducted during the performance of three new short plays by a selection of East End playwrights including Steven Berkoff and David Eldridge at the Arcola theatre as part of the East Festival. Cycle routes and cycle leaders were provided to marshal the audience between the shows.

NB It looks really successful, has it gone well?

AB Yes, its really good news. It’s been a complete showcase of sustainability coming together with the arts. People cycling to different venues, they get a chance to look at the highlights of Hackney along the way, they get a chance to experience what Hackney has to offer in terms of arts in a zero carbon way. So for us it’s perfect, a perfect meeting of sustainability and the arts.

NB How was this marketed, was it marketed specifically to cyclists or your usual outlets?

AB Time Out had a supplement which had the whole programme of East in it so a lot of marketing through that. Serious PR was the PR agency working on behalf of the London Mayors office to publicise it. We put it on the Arcola Energy website. Through word of mouth and information was put up around the theatre for the last three weeks and targeted (mailings) to various cycling organisations.

NB Did you get any funding tied to the cycling element?

AB No, we were just happy that the cycling element was there. Ben Todd, the executive director, a couple of years ago said we should do something like this with people cycling to various venues. It just promotes the pleasures of cycling, the ease of cycling, how easy it is to get round London with your bike. It gets people on bikes that wouldn’t think of cycling, like families, and it links theatre to cycling. For example, Arcola are installing a cycle enclosure at the end of March for staff to promote cycling and it will be open to the theatre companies that come into Arcola to create plays and to promote cycling with our audience. People can come here and know that their bikes are going to be safe.

NB Arcola’s ecological ethos is well established now. Did that start from the beginning?

AB The theatre was established in 2000. Ben established Arcola Energy in 2007. Since then we’ve installed our fuel cell and LED lighting and now have a sustainability projects manager post funded through the City Bridge Trust. I’m managing a number of projects that take us towards our ultimate goal of becoming carbon neutral in various ways and it is showcasing ways in which theatres can do that, and theatres that don’t have much money. That can be through Arcola’s roof garden which we will launch in May, through our Green Sundays Programme which is getting people to the theatre who may not usually come a theatre to talk about climate change; this has themes every month and it is exploring climate change through films, poetry, music with guest speakers. The first event happened on the 1st March with Friends of the Earth involved. We looked at the global food chain (one of FOE’s areas of focus for this year), various other projects like the mayor’s Green Theatre programme and we’re the secretariat for that. The ultimate aim of the Green Theatre Plan is to reduce theatre carbon emissions by 60% by 2025. We delighted that we are a major part of that. In my previous job I was working in the mayors office and that’s where we developed the plan and it was launched end of last year and it showed theatres the practical steps they need to take to be greener and it shows them that it is possible. What Arcola is about is showcasing what can be achieved and we’re not saying do exactly what we do but we are saying that the creative industries can be one of the most innovative players in climate change issues and we have the media power to communicate climate change to our audience.

NB When the theatre was founded, was the green ethos there from the beginning with artistic director Mehmet Erghen?

AB I think we had to establish ourselves artistically first and foremost and the structure (of the organisation) has grown out of the last two years. The theatre is one part, sustainability is another and youth and community is a third. They are all equally as important as each other. I think we are the first theatre that has such a structure and such an emphasis on green issues and community lead projects.

NB What compromises, if any, have to be made artistically to keep productions within the green vision of the theatre?

AB None and I think that’s the point. This year I am working with a production company to test the Green Theatre’s carbon calculator for one of our main house plays by working with actors to see how effective that is. So it’s about me bringing my skills in sustainability to production companies that will be able to tell me good and bad aspects of it and how it works for them, how useful it is for them but with me being there every step of the way. We’re lucky to be in a unique position where I am housed in a theatre where I am able to do that rather than being a policy maker coming along with “here’s your ten point plan”, I am working with the company to achieve that. We’re building on what happened last year with the Living Unknown Soldier (based on Le Soldat Inconnu Vivant by Jean-Yves Le Naour) Ben and staff from Arcola worked with the production company to produce a green play, and that anything from rather than printing scripts one sided, they do it double sided, but you’ve got to bear in mind that artists know what they want and some actors won’t want double sided scripts. Some lighting designers won’t want the whole play powered by less than 5Kw. It’s about us showing what’s possible, what opportunities are out there and slowly building movement. If you’re based in the theatre industry to begin with, it’s a better position to be in. A lot of production companies travel around and hopefully they will take these lessons with them.

NB Do you think people are on their best ‘green’ behaviour when they work with you?

AB No, because I think once you start doing green things, you find it saves you money. I would hope that people take those practices with them and that’s the new way that they do things rather than being tokenistic for one or two plays in this theatre. I think the creative industries have started to engage with this issue, not just theatre but music and film, the green screen and the music festivals. That work’s being built on year on year.

NB How do you deal with superstar demands, such as a limousine has to be sent and return again with one passenger.

AB I think in the theatre we’re lucky that I haven’t had to deal with those sorts of demands. In film I think it’s a bigger problem. You can’t tell artists no, but you can give them alternatives. That’s what the whole green movement is about. It’s not about reducing the quality but giving alternatives. You could get a taxi here or take the tube here but with our bicycle enclosure we are making it easier to take your bike here. I think that is the way forward for everybody. Once you’re in that movement, you meet other people with similar objectives. Where we get our organic food from, they recommended that I go with Mozzo coffee http://www.mozzocoffee.com so through partnerships that you’re making you are sharing information and it’s all quite a small world the green world. Even if you don’t have a dedicated sustainability manager, there are ways in which you can make easy changes. There are ways you can develop these things without any money. For our roof garden, we are members of Freecycle Hackney and there’s lots of gardening tools available on Freecycle.

NB Is this coffee more expensive?

AB I don’t know about exact costs but we’re not losing out on our margin.

NB What’s the hardest thing you’re finding with the people-side. Is anything failing right now?

AB Staff engagement is very important. The last thing I wanted to do when I started here was storm in to the kitchen and say you can’t source flapjacks from there but slowly make changes but communicate why we’re doing that to staff and how we’re going to do it. Because if people feel left out when you’re making those changes then you’re struggling, you are not getting past the first hurdle to reach your audience. There can be communication issues. I have a monthly newsletter that I give around the staff. It does a number of things including saying what changes we’re going to make but it is also asking what suggestions they can make. Our Waterhouse Restaurant www.waterhouserestaurant.co.uk relationship shows it’s all a bit of a learning curve for us. Before we were serving packaged foods that lasted a long time but now we’re serving fresh foods. It’s a challenge for our staff to prepare and serve it and a challenge for us to break even from the food but the relationship we have with the Waterhouse is valuable because of their excellent sustainability credentials so that is why we wanted to partner up with them.

NB How do you engage new hires in being green?

AB We’re quite lucky in that we are a small team. I meet with all the staff, and through the newsletter, just by talking to people. I now get a lot of people coming up to me and saying we should do this, it’s mainly one to one communication and through staff meetings. I think having a dedicated sustainability officer means that they know exactly who to come to and I then liaise with senior management if someone suggests a project we should do. We give staff feedback all the time on why we’re doing this. So for a small team I don’t see that as a problem. For a bigger organization, I remember when I was at City Hall we had on each floor an environmental champion who would monitor the recycling, check that people have turned their monitors off, so I think it depends on the size of the organization. We are also lucky because the interns and volunteers that come here are young and enthusiastic and often knowledgeable about green issues so they come with a lot of suggestions anyway. But it is translating that knowledge into practical actions is what you can do. In 2009 I want to start green staff packs that would look at what we are doing as a theatre and what we can do in the theatre and what people can do in their own homes.

NB Can people shower when they cycle to Arcola? Do they have a dedicated locker area?

AB They can shower backstage. We don’t have lockers but there are safe places to leave your stuff. I think it is about making the most of the space you have and not being too prescriptive about it. There’s positives and negatives about smaller and larger organisations. At City Hall we had a shower room on every floor.

NB Give me an example of an unexpected human problem.

AB I think one of the problems I have found is the constraints with what I can do within the infrastructure of the theatre building. I would love to get a biomass boiler from the Carbon Trust but they don’t have match funds for that kind of project so I think it’s those kind of big things, when you haven’t got the money, that’s frustrating. On an individual basis I can’t think of one. The staff here have been excellent and my postings have been welcomed with open arms. I’d love to more with the building. It doesn’t matter what you do so long as you are doing something.

NB Do you think all your staff are eco warrior or have you had to educate some of them?

AB I think many have grown and developed and become more aware about the issue. Key for me was not coming in and ramrodding everyone “you’re all crap because you are not being green”. I think it comes down to ways of managing relationships and it’s not me taking the higher moral ground as the sustainability person, it’s more from me learning about the theatre and learning what works.

NB If there was some bloody-minded person who didn’t put the paper in the recycling bin, how would you deal with it?

AB I would ask them how I would make it easier for them to recycle. Is that we need more bins, do they need to be better labelled? Is there any confusion about what can be recycled? But there is only so far that you can go to change behaviours. After that I can’t. People are powers unto themselves.

NB Sometimes people don’t want to raise the topic with their co-workers, even though they are seething that their co-worker doesn’t recycle. How is that dealt with?

AB To be honest I haven’t come across that problem so I am only thinking hypothetically. Some of the ways to persuading people to be green is everyone else doing it. So if 99% of the organisation is doing green things would hopefully influence the other 1% into doing it. There are people who won’t change but that happens in all aspects of life. If people have the knowledge, they have the way and it’s easy for them and they are still not doing it, then I’m sure there’s not much more you can do about that, maybe advertising more the benefits.

NB I notice you have paper towels in the bathrooms. Have you done a complete eco audit to make that choice?

AB Yes, we wanted to get a Dyson Airblade but they are too noisy. So again, there’s other kind of restraint within a building. First and foremost it’s a building where people are entertained but we hope we can source our paper towels from sustainable sources.

NB You are branded the ‘eco’ theatre. Do you ever want to move out of that?

AB No, I think we want to develop that branding. Arcola Energy is well known within the industry, we want to get that out to the general public. Theatres (and the like) contribute only 2% of London’s carbon emissions but it’s a message we can give the audiences. Theatre has a powerful role in getting out the message about climate change.

NB Do you think the eco badge has some baggage, you can be dismissed as a bunch of hippies?

AB I think that’s changing. The green movement is moving away from being seen like that because businesses, such as BSkyB, are taking it on. I think the huge spectrum of organisations taking it on and the Obama effect, now people don’t see greening as hemp shirt wearing, they see it as practical and, in the credit crunch, being green is saving money. There is logic behind it.

NB Does green have any say in the artistic or literary choices?

AB No

NB In the production process, do the producers feel they have to be on their best green behaviour to work here?

AB When I meet with production companies that are coming in, I find people are happy to work with me but in all aspects, people find it hard to change their habits. But with support, it makes it easier to do. I understand they want to create an artistically excellent play and in no way do I want to get in the way of that. We can usually meet half way. The theatre world is quite small, if they pick up one or two tips, they take that on with them. Every little helps. I don’t think our green credentials puts people off, quite the opposite. It’s a new way of thinking about theatre and theatre’s role.

NB Have you noticed any change in theatre practise that has been taken away from here?

AB People have come to appreciate you can be experimental about climate change. People have this fear that if an organization puts out its dirty washing about its carbon footprint, people are going to be critical of them but all what we’re trying to do is turn the tide a little bit. We not afraid to say we have an aim to be a carbon neutral theatre but we’re not there yet but we have the aim and the long term aim really helps.

NB What has changed in the last few years?

AB More arts venues are getting carbon audits. More are engaged in the issue and linking up with other creative industries. Our relationship with Julies Bicycle is extremely useful. The changes music venues are making are those theatre should be doing. A lot has changed in a very short time. A few years ago we would have been throwing away props that we weren’t going to use again, now we put them on Freecycle. Just demonstrating the use of LEDs that you can read by makes a difference and counters what people read about them in the Daily Mail.

NB What’s your priority now?

AB I think communicating carbon. Get people involved in the issues that wouldn’t be involved otherwise. People from the community around in Hackney, get them down here talking about the environment, not to lecture them but in an informal social manner, making Arcola a hub of community activity.

NB Describe the steps in implementing a new green initiative?

AB My first port of call is the front of house staff. I have to change the waste collection from once to twice a week, so if they’re not going to put the bags out or do that the extra work, it’s not going to work (Arcola had to arrange for its own collection after the council moved the recycling bins they were using down the road) but no one’s said “we’re not going to do it”. I have to establish they can come and talk to me about anything like that. It can be difficult, people in theatre have little time so I’ve got to be careful not to bother people but when I actually approach them with an idea for a project, I’ve got to know exactly what I’m talking about.

NB Anyone else I should talk to?

AB You should contact Julie’s Bicycle and talk to Andrew Howarth at Live Nation.

The Arcola Theatre in London is making bold strides toward being the world’s first carbon neutral theater, through innovations such as energy efficient LED lighting systems – and the world’s first fuel cell powered performance. In addition, Arcola Energy is a pioneering new venture that will bring cutting-edge sustainability practices to other arts organizations. Ben Todd, Executive Director of Arcola Theatre, shares insights that could help any type of organization or business get started in being more sustainable.

INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS

• The most important first step an organization should take for a successful sustainability project
• Why “artists and scientists are quite often very much the same” when working with them on sustainability projects
• Whether “going green” helps to sell more theater tickets

LISTEN NOW (press below)

TRANSCRIPT

Patrick Dominguez, Green Business Innovators:

Hello, this is Patrick Dominguez here with Ben Todd, the executive director of Arcola Theatre. Welcome, Ben.

Ben Todd, Arcola Theatre: Thank you, Patrick.

Patrick Dominguez: Ben, tell us a little bit about the Arcola Theatre and the type of theater that you do here.

Ben Todd: Arcola Theatre, it is an off West End theater in East London. It started about 8 years ago in the classic tradition of the London fringe. No money, a lot of artistic vision. It was founded by artists, and its strength essentially was that of Mehmet Ergen, artistic director and Leyla Nazli who is now the executive producer, who essentially founded the theater on personal loans, on credit cards and incredible vision and an ability to really inspire people and bring people together to deliver the art that they wanted to deliver. Since then, over the past 8 years it has gone from strength to strength artistically. And increasingly as an organization is this maturity you have to develop in terms of stability, fund-raising and management systems. So particularly, I suppose over the last 3 or 4 years, I have done a lot of work on that with a view to creating an organization initially on which I could almost perch on the back of and do sustainability projects, which is my background. And I know over the last 2 years I realized that it is actually far better to actually directly integrate them – except that I never will finish trying to set up the theater and actually developing the two of them in parallel is far more sensible.

Patrick Dominguez: One thing that I will add to what Ben is saying is that this theater has gotten rave reviews. They consistently get fantastic reviews with the theater productions that they do here.

Ben Todd: Definitely true and actually crucial. If I was to go off and do sustainability projects in a theater that was not considered an artistic leader, it would be seen as almost fringe in the kind of disparaging sense.

Patrick Dominguez: Like a distraction.

Ben Todd: Yeah, or just people who cannot really function in the mainstream, going and playing on the fringe. There is this snobbery. There is this great passion for brilliant things coming from the fringe, but there is always that sense of, it is the people that cannot make it in the mainstream. So, the idea of running a place that has a fringe feel and anything is possible and anybody can do anything, but definitive international caliber work is pretty crucial.

Patrick Dominguez: Could you explain step-by-step the sustainability work that you have done for the theater, and try to frame it in a way that if other theater people were listening right now, what sort of model or formula would they be able to follow?

Ben Todd: The key, I think particularly across all sectors, but particularly in the arts sector is to lead with vision.

What I get frustrated with within sustainability is the sense that if you try to do something green, you must therefore be holier than thou. If you want to recycle paper, you have to think about everything. As soon as you try to do anything green, people will persecute you because of the one thing you do that is not green. So, that does not work in wider society and certainly not in the arts. So, start with a vision. Have a vision. In our sense the headline was we are going to become carbon neutral. You do not have to actually realize that ultimate vision. That is just the thing that inspires you to move. So, start from that, set your vision. Do you want to be carbon neutral. You want to deliver sustainable work. You want to make some kind of difference. From that, do something. Pick one project that you can deliver and deliver it. And then what follows I think then from there is the rigor. Then you start to learn, you start to bring in the expertise you might need. And you start to build a team that can deliver. The key then is to then once you have done that – almost go full circle and go back to vision. And say, so I started the great idea, I have implemented some rigor, I may have done some kind of audit of my organization, but I didn’t just put it in a drawer and forget about it and tick the box. I took it, I said okay, I’ve done that, what can we do now? How can I make this exciting? How can I make this inspiring?

Patrick Dominguez: So, what was your first project?

Ben Todd: The first project for us was actually the vision, it was to launch the vision. Because, when we started about 18 months, a year ago, there was almost nothing. I now know that there were people doing things, but completely hidden. It was technical managers here and there surreptitiously changing light bulbs and not telling anyone. So I think that the concept that the arts should engage with sustainability, it really was not very widespread. So, that if you like, was our first project, which now looking back seems almost trivial. The mayor of London now has got an entire initiative around sustainability in theaters, but a year ago that was not there. That was the first. Here’s my vision, this is what we want to do. After that it was partnerships. Who can we bring along? How can we build credibility? How can we build skills? How can we build the networks we need?

Patrick Dominguez: Did you have a particular sustainability project in mind as your first one?

Ben Todd: No. What emerged – my background is in fuel cells. That was an obvious I suppose first project if you like. That’s become our flagship if you like, installing a full cell here. So we now have a 5-kilowatt fuel cell which powers the bar lighting and selected shows. The other key I think was to link it to productions. So, we said, rather than making this long-term organizational project, it was to say that this show will be delivered sustainably, and therefore by the opening night of this show we will have changed all of the bar stock, all of the cleaning products. We will have changed the bar lighting system. We will have installed the fuel cell and we will have established techniques and partnerships to light the show sustainably. So, it all kind of came together into this fairly epic project. Because again, there is something about, you have to deliver a project that is big enough that people care. If you talk to people, particularly artists, I think, about recycling bottles, it’s not interesting. Eyes glaze over.

Patrick Dominguez: So what you did was you said “we’re going to make this production sustainable.”

Ben Todd: Absolutely, and then work back from that. So, that if you like was the vision and then you work back. How do you actually rigorously do that.

Patrick Dominguez: And in terms of rigor, did you think about well what are the most environmentally unfriendly practices in your production and start with items with the highest impact? Is that how you went about it?

Ben Todd: Not too much. The biggest impact is audience travel. Which if you think about it for a while you quickly realize, or of course you can spend a lot of time measuring it. I did not know again because it was vision before rigor. The first thing was just to do it, to inspire people. There is a lot that I have seen with a background in sustainability. I have a fairly good feel for what is and isn’t a priority. So I can kind of, I suppose inform you and instinctively prioritize. I was very cautious of getting involved in auditing and trying to work out what is the best possible thing to do. Because I think in a year or 2 years that it takes you to do that you could have actually done half the things that you are going to do anyway. If you like, that is a big bugbear of mine is that organizations spend a lot of time thinking about what to do when they could just do it.

Patrick Dominguez: So instead of auditing and thinking for a year or two of how you are going to do it, how did you actually go about making this production sustainable?

Ben Todd: The first thing I suppose was to find a young company who were interested in doing that. So I didn’t have to force anybody to do anything. A young producer, a young theater company who wanted to do this. I said to them, okay, you deal with your side, the looking at the rehearsal space, at water usage during rehearsals, the prints, printed material for the flyers, the costumes of the set. I look at the, I suppose, the bigger infrastructural elements. So I look at where we get the energy from to drive the lighting and the sound. I look at what type of alternative lighting systems we can use. I do a lot of the, I suppose in some sense the high-level brokering, the relationship building. So yes, effectively you split the tasks. The management system I suppose I have developed here is very much based on the way arts management seems to work to me which is that director’s role. The director identifies the skills that he needs and then the director goes and finds people with those skills and gets them to do it. And again, so that you do not get too holy and precious about everything. You do not have to micromanage everything. You just set people on the road and the “it will be alright on the night” principle. It is quite powerful. It will be opening on this night. You will do the best that you possibly can by that night. Again, that takes away a lot of the preciousness and a lot of the hesitation and that kind of rigor mortis, I call it, where you just literally never get anywhere. Details, information people may want will follow. It is just starting to come through on our blog now. And again, motivated by the fact that we’ve done something brilliant. All of the write-up follows later. Do that later.

Patrick Dominguez: All of this work that you have done of course helps the environment. Has it also benefitted the theater in some way? Has it attracted more theatergoers or helped to sell more tickets?

Ben Todd: I’d say that it has had massive, massive benefits to the theater, some of which, every theater and every organization could gain. Some of which obviously we gained from essentially being the first and certainly the most prominent. The key I suppose is partnerships, as a relatively small theater organization we are not strategically significant to most major funding bodies, industry and lighting industry. Yet as the leading sustainable theater we have certainly become quite strategically significant. You can sit at a higher table, if you like. So, you become party to much more useful, long-term strategic visions. You have access to brilliant people.

Patrick Dominguez: Can you give a couple of examples?

Ben Todd: I suppose the obvious very practical would be somebody like White Light which is a theater lighting supply company. So now, I can, I suppose ring the managing director and say that I have got this idea or I need this equipment. Can you support us? It’s very small, relatively small amounts of money, but it makes a big difference to a theater company. So, when I want to persuade a lighting designer to use a low energy lighting rig, I can say, well if you do this your objective is to get me Critic’s Choice and a brilliant show, but if you make it sustainable I’ll give Brian a call and see if I can get him to lend you what you want. So that would be one, the other I suppose then is working at high-level within the arts council, within local government, within the mayor of London’s office, increasingly within our local London borough council. As a theater again, creative industries does not feature that highly on many borough councils’ list. But a leading sustainable theater actually does. So you get to the point again where you can move up and build much better relationships with those sort of strategic stakeholders.

Patrick Dominguez: So you become kind of a jewel in the community.

Ben Todd: Yeah, and there is something about this space where you bring sustainability and culture together. You often find really good, talented and motivated people. The ability to attract those people is clearly a benefit. Recruitment becomes much easier. The energy team that we have put together at the moment, so far with no money, are brilliant. I have incredible university graduates, post-graduates coming and working with us because they have been attracted to this vision of sustainability in a cultural setting.

Patrick Dominguez: So, you’ve mentioned that doing this work has helped to attract partners, local municipal partners, government partners, business partners. How about theatergoers?

Ben Todd: It is interesting. We haven’t done a lot of work on does it influence theatergoers. In London on any given night I think there are about 200 shows running. People are pretty much driven either by special interests – they may have an interest in Ibsen – or by reviews. They will simply look and say I am going to trek halfway across London to see a show it had better be good. So, they will go on artistic reputation of the company, of the venue or literally on how many stars the show got. We have seen a certain increase again from the partners that kind of word of mouth, the fact that there’s increased interest within the industry in Arcola brings you some audience. I would say that we quite deliberately actually not linked our green PR with our theater PR. I don’t want people to come and see a show because it was green. I want people to come and see a show because it is brilliant. So in some sense, I have not collected the kind of data that I could then wave at people to motivate them and say being green sells more tickets. With a kind of longer-term, strategic view I think maybe I should do that as a way of showing people that you can get that benefit. But I am very, very aware of that danger, that fundamentally producing a theater show is a non-sustainable activity. It has a carbon footprint therefore if you do it badly the most sustainable thing to do is just not do it. So, I am very, very careful I suppose with how I sell, if that’s in any way an answer.

Patrick Dominguez: You have been doing a lot of work here to reduce your impact. Are you doing work with other art organizations to spread the gospel of reducing environmental impact?

Ben Todd: Yes. I think we have had a fairly major impact. Primarily it is very simple, somebody has to start. Once one person, one organization starts everybody suddenly goes, ah, we should start. We have been thinking about it for how ever many years. We have got these little pockets of best practice within the organization. Maybe that person who has been busily nagging us about light bulbs should be brought to a slightly higher table and given maybe a larger budget and a bit more influence. I think I have seen quite a lot of that personally within organizations. And then across the world the kind of interest we have had. Again, it just, you tend to have individuals within organizations who are pushing this agenda and for them to be able to say, look they’ve done it. Look at all the publicity they have got. Look at all the benefits they’ve gained. It really helps. It allows them to move forward. Now, increasingly on a practical basis I do an awful lot of speaking at conferences and sitting on panels. We are just about to launch effectively a consultancy service which we will go out and do a bit of pro bono work helping theaters install the basics. And ultimately I would hope a revenue stream for Arcola as an organization to deliver literally, I suppose, environmental management services, with a cultural awareness. So, there is quite a lot of environmental management around, but to find organizations, or companies, contractors who understand the arts industry, who understand the third sector, charitable sector, who have staff, who have the rigor, but also understand the need for vision and understand the need for communication. So, I think that element will grow quickly.

Patrick Dominguez: You mentioned to me the Arcola Energy project. Could you talk a little bit about that project?

Ben Todd: The energy project if you would like it is the umbrella for everything. So, it is everything from the sustainable shows to changing our suppliers or harassing our suppliers, to implement some kind of sustainable or ethical procurement process. All the way up to the bit I haven’t mentioned so far, which is the Arcola Energy incubator which we are now sitting in, which is essentially the top floor of the building. Arcola is in a 4-story late-Victorian industrial building of which the theater occupies two floors. The middle floor is still a clothes factory, and now we have the top floor. In which I’d like to host a suite, if you like, of sustainability companies, with a technical focus. So it’s the energy incubator. Energy in some sense being a shorthand for all things sustainable. But I suppose, quite a nice one because the obvious iconic part of theater is the lighting which is directly into electrical energy. So the companies we are looking at, at the moment, are major lighting manufacturers and a fairly major fuel cell installer or sustainable energy systems installer who will quite literally be resident here with whom we can then develop cooperative projects between the companies. We have services that we can buy in if need be. We have companies that we can pass people on to. So in some sense become some kind of honest broker. There is an awful lot of rubbish spoken about sustainability. There are quite a lot of charlatans there. So to be able to introduce arts companies to companies that are tried and tested and very accountable, I had to create this wild space where you can come down for coffee and you might meet an artistic director, a theater director, an actor, an actress or an electronics expert, or a sustainability consultant. Or who knows, a fuel cell installer, a solar panel installer, electrician, a builder. The whole range, literally from the kind of cultural intelligence needed to change behavior very quickly to the technical skills needed to deliver projects on time and on budget.

Patrick Dominguez: Sounds like unlikely bedfellows. Maybe one day we’ll be able to buy LED light bulbs at the theater bar along with a theater ticket.

Ben Todd: It was always one of the jokes – “would you like a low-energy light bulb with your tickets?” I expect it to happen. Although, it may have reached the point where low-energy light bulbs are not really that interesting, and we will move on to the next exciting thing that you might want to pick up with your ticket. But the other point I suppose is they are not unlikely bedfellows actually. If you spend some time in science and research and spend some time in the arts you’ll realize that artists and scientists are quite often very much the same. They are both difficult, cranky, self-obsessed, visionary, dislike paperwork, dislike being forced to conform to fit their ideas into some other box that somebody else created. They both rely on some kind of producer and some kind of broker, some kind of CEO to take their ideas, to build a team and to realize them. Actually, there is more understanding than you might think.

Patrick Dominguez: That is one of the more surprising insights from this interview. Ben, I know that Arcola Theatre has done a lot of work to reduce its impact on the environment. Can you tell me a little bit about the inspiration behind that?

Ben Todd: Yeah. The inspiration I suppose has come from my background. I spent about 10 years in engineering sustainability. I did my Ph.D. on the modeling of solid oxide fuel cells. That’s high temperature, next generation power generation systems, working with Rolls Royce who are at the moment, aside from making airplane engines, also do a lot of power generation equipment based on gas turbines. So, I did all of this fairly heavy research into that, always looking for the final objective of what we were actually trying to get to, what we were going to deliver, the problems we were going to solve and eventually of course realized that actually research probably is not the right place to be if you are focused on delivering tangible projects. So, I came out of that and did some consulting, and got a bit frustrated with again not delivering something, and stumbled into Arcola and thought – this is it. This is where it all works. This is a place that I can effectively and in some sense highjack and use as a place in which to embed the projects and that I spent time developing, but never quite realizing. I suppose I started gradually lobbying Mehmet and Leyla and the various artists associated with the theater to bring this in, to mainstream it into the theater program. I guess ultimately we kind of succeeded. So now there is very much this shared vision of artistic excellence and sustainability throughout. And now, it just grows.

Patrick Dominguez: So, what I am trying to understand is in thinking with the hats of the creative director and the artistic director, how did they decide to bring you into the team as a sustainability expert? It does not seem like the obvious choice for a theater executive director.

Ben Todd: Yeah, I suppose that’s the key is that I was not brought in as a sustainability person. If fact, I was not really brought in. Arcola is really not that kind of place. I suppose increasingly now we do, but certainly when I joined nobody was really brought in. People came. People did things that were good and that needed to be done and stuck around for as long as it suited them. Obviously, it suits me quite well, so I stuck around for rather a long time. I went from I suppose essentially someone who helped fix a few computers to chief executive responsible for making sure that the company functions.

Patrick Dominguez: How long have you been with the Arcola Theatre?

Ben Todd: About 4 years now, and essentially the sustainability, it was part of my interest, and again that is something of the theater that if you put something into making the theater work and you have a vision or a dream that you want to realize, if it can be realized within the remit of the theater, then that’s what we do. You don’t recruit a sustainability person into theater. Or people didn’t. Maybe they now will, following our example.

Patrick Dominguez: Ben, are there any other thoughts or ideas that you want to share related to the theater work that you’re doing and the sustainability work?

Ben Todd: (laughter) I could talk for a very long time. I think the key is just start, lead with vision. Bring in the rigor you need but don’t drown yourself in rigor. Don’t bore people. If people start to glaze over, move on. And always go back to vision. It’s all about vision. And the key that integrating culture, culture activities and sustainability brings is the ability to change behavior quickly. Sustainability practitioners, we need to use cultural skills. We need the cultural sector because we can build the best machines but if no one likes them then they’re not going to use them.

Patrick Dominguez: Ben, thank you very much for this interview, it’s been very interesting.

Ben Todd: You’re more than welcome. Thank you.

1. What artistic freedom or hindrance does going green create?
Potentially imposes restriction on what you can and can’t do – powering a show off fuel cell in our case immediately imposed a 5kw max power constraint which has the potential to affect the quantity and type of lighting fixtures you can use, as well as potentially limiting how far you can push things in a tech.
Lantern placement and visual appearance of lanterns also becomes an issue. People are used to tungsten sources: Placing LEDs in a theatre with a low rig makes a bold “futuristic” artistic statement. LED fixtures opens up the world of colour changing creating more artistic freedom during a tech. The LED lighting in our bar allows front of house staff to change the mood of the bar, something not possible with our previously static rig.
It also allowed us to create valuable relationships with companies already working on similar projects or equipment (e.g. White Light, PixelRange, ETC, Selecon, Central), and has, as a result, given us access to equipment otherwise out of our budget.

2. What would you differently in a similar project?
More accurate monitoring tools are needed in our case to allow us to better meassure (and understand) loads.

3. What advice would you give to someone who wanted to do this?
Play with equipment in advance where possible.Don’t rule out tungsten sources. Talk to as many people in advance as possible and look at as many products as possible from different manufacturers. Don’t forget about simple energy saving measures (e.g. turning dimmers / stage lighting / computers off when not needed)

4. What has been your biggest problem? How did you solve it?
Problem: Unfamiliarity with equipment (including the fuel cell)
Solution: Trial and error, playing with and testing equipment, and asking people in the know.

5. What have the advantages been? Such as more time, more assistance, larger budget?
Access to technology otherwise outside our budget, often supported by technical expertise of individuals working in the industry. Industry and press exposure

6. What has surprised you?
The effectiveness and energy efficiency of many tungsten sources (e.g. Selecon 50w Aureols, ETC Source 4s). The effectiveness of lower wattage lamps (when re-lamping our Source 4s with 375 lamps instead of 575w lamps we expected to have to run them at close to 100% to get an output equivalent to a 575w lamp at 60%, where as in reality we still get away with running the 375s at 60%). How unfamiliar many people in the industry are with low energy equipment when you start to ask questions, and therefore how hard it can be to find out about low energy equipment (e.g. our method of finding a good brand of low energy Par38 bulbs was to buy one of each we could find as no one seemed to know the answer already).

7. Is there anything you would like to add?
Theatre has always thrived on creativity, collaboration and solving complex problems with limited resources. The challenge of making theatre more sustainable relies on and requires the same skill set. People who find solutions to problems or innovative ways of reducing waste or electricity consumption should share their knowledge and experience of equipment and techniques. Everyone is free to post on http://www.arcolaenergy.com/contribute/, and the more people that do the more the industry will learn.

Jazz Wood: How much and what do you do on the ‘living unknown soldier’ project?
Ben Todd: Huge amount of partnership brokering and PR a few days per week for about 2 months.
Total cost to Arcola was less than £2000 after sponsorship etc.

JW: I know you have solar panels, fuel cells and a biomass boiler, what else do you have in place to reduce the venue’s carbon footprint?
BT: We don’t have solar or bio mass yet.
Changing suppliers.
Reducing lighting power consumption.
Re-use / recycle.

JW: How much energy do you get from the solar panels and biomass boiler?
BT: At present none, eventually all of it.

JW: Do you feed the boiler the canteen’s waste food? Paper? What about the emissions from burning the fuel?
BT: No it is composted. Eventually we will feed it old sets and local builders waste. Emissions from burning are a problem, but since we are using waste which has been produced already and it is all wood-based which captured CO2 when it was growing it is sensible to consider it carbon-neutral.

JW: Does the fuel cell match up to their usual power supply or does it make demands on how the show is lit, temperature storage, does it need a refill, can it handle sudden demands for power, is the rest of the electrical system the same or is it specialist. Can any Joe Bloggs buy one/use one. Is it dangerous?
BT: The most important benefit of the fuel cell is that it motivates lighting designers to reduce power consumption to under 5kW. A saving of 60% or more.

JW: Do you encourage your staff to come to work in an energy efficient way? If so how? How successful has this been?
BT: Not especially. Most staff use public transport / walk anyway.

JW: When did you start ‘thinking green’ and what prompted you?
BT: It was a very long time ago.
Have spent about 10 years learning/working/thinking about sustainable living/technologies.
Can’t remember what prompted it other than enjoying the natural world and seeing the madness of destroying it so quickly, particularly given the terrible consequences for people.

JW: How has government legislation regarding green issues influenced the project?
BT: Government policy (and indirectly the existence and threat of legislation) has made it possible. This is particularly true of the local government policy of Mayor Ken Livingstone.

JW: What government support is there with this sort of action? What government support do you think there should be?
BT: There is significant government support for the large capital projects such as installing fuel cells.
There is limited local government support (again through initiatives of London Mayor Ken Livingstone).
We need much more support (primarily financial) if we are to make the changes necessary to prevent extreme climate change.

JW: What has been your biggest problem? How did you solve it?
BT: Lack of money, partnerships.

JW: What have the advantages been? Such as extra funding, more volunteers etc. Is there anything which this project gained from that other non eco friendly projects don’t?
BT: New partnerships, on an equal footing, with organisations much larger and more established than Arcola Theatre.
Favourable support from industry partners.
Additional support from high calibre volunteers .

JW: What has surprised you?
BT: How quickly and dramatically we made an impact with such limited resources.
How much support and goodwill we have received from our partners.

JW: Is there anything you would like to add?
BT: In my view the key factors in the arts doing their part in driving sustainability are:
Act now. Lack of resources does not prevent us from delivering arts projects, they should not prevent us from delivering sustainability projects.
Keep focus on projects which are interesting and motivate people to change rather than annoying them with trivia and paperwork.
Work in partnership and support each other.
Work to integrate the knowledge and skills of the arts in motivating and engaging people in to sustainability projects in other sectors.
Realise that there is significant benefit to be gained from delivering projects which satisfy multiple objectives – it is well established that youth/community engagement can be delivered as part of art projects and attracts additional funding sources, the same is true if art & sustainability projects.