27 October 2009
Energy researcher Catherine Bottrill appears in a documentary programme about energy consumption in the music industry for teachersTV.com
Energy researcher Catherine Bottrill appears in a documentary programme for teachersTV.com which takes a look at how the music industry can work to reduce its energy consumption and carbon footprint.
Catherine has been working to explore and quantify energy consumption within the music industry for the past two years. In collaboration with other ECI researchers, Catherine led the first attempt to footprint the whole music industry in 2008 in a report commissioned by the NGO Julie’s Bicycle. Read First Step: UK Music Industry Greenhouse Gas Emissions for 2007
The report highlighted three areas where the UK music market will need to target greenhouse gas emissions: CD packaging, venue energy use, and audience travel. The study showed that audience travel from live music events account for three-quarters of the total emissions from this sector in the UK.
Read a recent article in the Observer which draws on the First Step report to investigate: Are music downloads greener than CDs?.
To help businesses and individuals to monitor their carbon emissions ECI have developed two online monitoring tools: imeasure and SMEeasure are both free to sign up:
- SMEasure is an easy-to-use energy management tool enabling your business to measure, benchmark and target your building’s energy use and emissions. Designed by leading energy researchers at Oxford University, SMEasure connects small and medium businesses (SMEs) with building energy management expertise and good practice.
- imeasure is a household energy management tool to enable you to get accurate facts on your home energy use, see how much you have spent, how much you have saved and compare you usage with your friends.
Both imeasure and SMEasure are recommended as part of the teaching materials for the programme, which link to the national curriculum requirements for Key Stage 3.
Alongside her ongoing connection with the ECI, Catherine is with the RESOLVE programme at Surrey University continuing to study the music industry's response to climate change. She remains still actively involved with developing imeasure and smeasure.