The Greenbelt Festival Opts for an All-electric Event Hire Fleet
The Greenbelt Festival, held at Boughton House near Kettering over four days in August, has been using Electric Wheels for event buggy hire since 2019. This was the year the event organisers achieved their goal to cut diesel emissions by 50%. Fast forward to 2022 and Greenbelt’s utility vehicles are now 100% electric!
The festival has been cutting its carbon footprint since signing the Festival Vision 2025 pledge in 2016. Adopting the use of electric vehicles on site was a large part of achieving its goal to cut its carbon footprint by half by 2025. Event buggy hire from Electric Wheels has played an impressive role to date.
For the 2022 Festival, Electric Wheels supplied 35 electric utility vehicles to Greenbelt, including ‘The HiSun Sector 5kW’ and ‘The Nipper’ 4×4 electric buggies, and UBCO’s G4 2×2 electric motorbikes.
The vehicles are used for a variety of purposes, including ferrying artists around the site, by the production team for moving equipment, acting as ‘taxis’ for festival-goers, and as staff transport.
Greenbelt Swaps Its On-site Buggies to Electric
“Initially we were concerned that electric UTVs wouldn’t be up to the job, given that our site has very few roads and is basically a greenfield site,” says Jess Jones, Event Manager for Greenbelt. “We need our vehicles to be able to access all areas of the site, and to keep going all day – so range is really important as well.”
The ability to ‘access all areas’ is an important consideration. The robustness and agility of the vehicles supplied by Electric Wheels enables staff to do just that.
From a 100% diesel fleet in 2017, Greenbelt’s utility vehicles are now 100% electric, boosting the Festival’s environmental credentials, eliminating intrusive engine noise on site, and receiving high approval ratings from the socially-aware festival audience.
A Carbon Saving of 3.67 Tonnes
Given that burning a litre of diesel produces around 2.62kg of carbon dioxide (source Carbon Footprint Calculator, Fleet News), then a notional saving of 10 litres of diesel per day across 35 vehicles during the four day Festival equates to a carbon saving of 3.67 tonnes – and that does not take into account the set-up and breakdown periods, which account for a further 17 days.
Jess continues: “Using Electric Wheels for event buggy hire has helped us grow our confidence in EVs. We have been pleasantly surprised at how powerful and robust they are, and how long they go for.
To be honest, we thought that the production crew would want their old diesel vehicles back, but the electric UTVs completely won them over. We have now swapped all our on-site buggies to electric, and we won’t go back.
Our audience is the type to tell you what they think of what you are doing, and being able to go completely electric with our on-site UTVs has gone down really well with them. The acceleration of how your audience sees you is almost as important as the environmental impact.
Sustainability is at the heart of what we do. Working with Electric Wheels, and benefitting from their innovation has enabled us to make huge strides forward in achieving that aim.”
Having swapped all on-site buggies to electric, the Festival is now using its experience working with Electric Wheels to explore how it can further expand its use of EVs across the site. “Having Electric Wheels as a test case has really grown our confidence in going electric,” adds Jess Jones.
Thanks to Events Manager Jess Jones for sharing the Greenbelt Festival’s experience of the all-terrain hire fleet. Book a test drive to put the UTVs to the test yourself, get in touch. Call us on 0333 3582175 or email us at enquiries@electric-wheels.co.uk.
