USI's Aisling Cusack: Why Being Eco-Friendly Is A Must for Students

I went to my first festival in 2014, lugging an enormous tent and reams of things I didn’t need, arriving with bruises on my shoulders from what I thought was a well-padded backpack. It became customary to go to the supermarket the night before and stock up on an endless supply of snacks and toiletries. The kind of packaging these products came in and the impact they had on the environment didn’t even sprout to mind. Always arriving early, there would be ample spaces of green to choose where to set up for the weekend. You pitch your tent, crack open a can, and the weight of the world, along with your backpack, tent, and alcohol is all lifted from your shoulders.

At festivals we gather in thousands, creating new homes for the weekend, making new friends and enjoying new experiences as music beats through our hearts, lights flicker through leaves and branches and we dance beneath the stars, forgetting that anything outside of the magical realm exists. We leave lighter, as if any worries we may have had have been taken away by forest fairies.

That’s not all we leave. We leave what were once beautiful, empty, green fields, in a unrecognisable state, filled with crisp packets, plastic bottles, empty cans, left-behind tents and chairs. And we leave it all too easily. Think of the main stage after the headline act of the night finishes up their set and the crowds disperse towards the deeper parts of the festival grounds. The bright white lights beam down, revealing an entire field of glistening, plastic cups. It’s remarkable how beautiful they look in their thousands, creating a silvery shimmer along the ground. Yet, it’s shameful and disgusting that we cannot clean up after ourselves.

Ireland, per head of its population, is one of the top producers of plastic waste in the world. We use over 200,000,000 coffee cups per year. That’s over half-a-million cups per day. We might be sick of hearing it, and many of us are using reusable cups, but are we convincing others to do the same? How many plastic forks do you use throughout the week? Why not try moving to bamboo utensils? Have you tried carrying around a tote bag instead of having to opt for plastic? The plastic bag is only 53-years-old and could take up to a 1,000 years to decompose.

As students, we have the ability to change hearts and minds. We do it regularly these days. What’s changing now is the climate. It’s on us to fix it. Let’s be conscious of the impact we have on the world we live in. Let’s cut down on plastic. Let’s check ourselves before purchases by having a “don’t need, don’t buy” rule.

Let’s leave those ample green spaces green, the way we found them, and pick up our tents, reduce our waste – and convince those around us that being eco-friendly is cool.