top of page

Climate Emergency

Policy Statement

​

Lyra is in a unique position to engage in climate justice work because of the extraordinary community we work within. We are acutely aware of the daily pressures faced by our families, not just financial. We are mindful that the climate emergency is not immediate for our community with many local people living in survival mode, not looking ahead but taking the simplest path and finding ways to achieve small pleasures in life. Lyra acknowledges that it has a role and responsibility to take a leading role in helping our community to understand their place in the climate crisis, to challenge thinking and inspire change. Lyra’s team understand the need to be better informed and continually skill up on climate justice.

Targets

Lyra tracks and reports annually on co2 emissions aligned with the April to March financial year. At 7.1 tonnes of core co2 emissions per year, Lyra is already a comparably low-level emitter. 64% of co2e comes from electricity usage, 20% from gas usage, 2% from waste and 14% from company travel.

 

Net Zero Objectives to reach Net Zero by 2030:

  • Use the Theatre Green Book methodology to:

    • Achieve Preliminary standard by June 2025​

    • Achieve Basic standard by December 2026

    • Achieve Intermediate standard by December 2028

    • Achieve Advanced standard by December 2030

  • Productions

    • Train our workforce to become carbon literate and change our thinking around the sustainability of productions

    • Embed sustainability from the outset of the production process

    • Track all materials we use (e.g. props, sets and costumes)

    • Reduce the amount of raw/new materials and increase the amount of reused and recycled materials

    • Always consider the future life of production materials to increase reuse

  • Operations

    • Reduce paper usages and make digital systems sustainable​

    • Reduce carbon emissions related to food and eliminate single use plastics

    • Record and interpret energy readings and train building users in energy saving behaviour

    • Increase recycling of all materials and reduce landfill year-on-year

    • Reduce carbon emissions through business travel and deliveries

    • Consider and include sustainability in procurement of resources

  • Building 

    • Insulate our building so it needs less energy

    • Make efficient use of heating and lighting controls so it uses less energy

    • Raise a £10k pa Net Zero development budget to tackle three main areas:

      • ​Replace flushing urinals with waterless systems by 2026

      • Better control of air circulation and heat loss by 2027

      • Replace all lighting systems with LED by 2028

    • Install solar PV to generate electricity​

Achievements

In 2024 we:

  • Established our leadership and board Environmental Champions and Green Team

  • Half of our core team trained and qualified in Carbon Literacy

  • Signed off our Environmental Sustainability Policy and communicated this with our Young Artists and core staff team

  • Added Environmental Sustainability information to our job adverts/callouts

  • Enacted lots of 'quick wins'

    • Productions:

      • Employed a single designer for the Bright & Wild Festival to reuse materials across multiple shows where possible​

      • Given away show costumes to young performers so they can reuse them and donated any unclaimed items to charity

      • Re-homed unused instruments, set pieces and props to other artists

    • Building:

      • started a building-wide Net Zero Action Group​

      • reduced the heating temperature by 2 degrees​

      • begun replacement of light bulbs with LED

    • Operations:​

      • installed whiteboards and projectors in our studio and theatre to reduce paper usage

      • improved signage on recycling points

      • changed all cleaning products to sustainable, concentrated/water soluble, plastic-free, vegan approved, free from Palm Oil, VOC’s, Phosphates and EDTA alternatives

bottom of page