Spreading the green message at Leeds Festival

Dee Nunn was a Green Messenger at this year's Leeds bash - telling festival-goers about recycling and encouraging them to donate their tents afterwards.

Sorting through the recycling bags. Cans for recycling left in a tent. Collecting the tents. The scene after the festival.

When I got an e-mail from Generation Why telling me about being a Green Messenger at Leeds, the prospect of a free ticket was enough on its own to hold my attention. They wanted volunteers to encourage festival goers to recycle, and to talk to them about the Give Me Shelter project run by the charity Global Hand. This project collects abandoned camping equipment at festivals and distributes it to where its needed, such as summer camps for Romanian orphans. Get a free festival ticket, save the planet, help some people out. This sounded like such a great thing to do.

We had three shifts over the weekend – my first involved giving out the recycling bags for plastic bottles, cans and general rubbish as people came out of the wristband exchange. Everyone came through so quickly we rarely had time to explain what each bag was for, or where the recycling points were. And we didn't get a chance to mention that, if people handed in empty gas canisters (rather than explode them on fires), they would be entered into a draw to win free festival tickets. We ended up shouting things like "recycle and get free beer!", as each bag of recycling that got handed in was worth a voucher for a beer.

The second shift was much more successful. We wandered around the campsites encouraging people to donate their tents at the end of the festival (rather than slash and burn them), and giving out bags to those who needed them. Most people in my campsite were really interested in the scheme and positive about using the recycling bags (or at least at the prospect of the beer they got for handing them in). A few people said they were going to leave their tents, though few were persuaded into actually taking them down to hand in.

With those first two shifts over, we were free to enjoy the festival itself! My own personal favourites include Gogol Bordello's crazy set and, following a recommendation from a fellow Green Messenger, the King Blues as a ska warm-up to Capdown's last ever Leeds performance. The Pigeon Detectives went down a storm so near to their hometown and the festival culminated with me jumping around to Hot Hot Heat, who I sneaked off to see halfway through the Red Hot Chili Peppers' two-hour set.

It was Sunday night when the trashing of tents kicked off. The Green Messengers I was camping with at the orange campsite put out two tent fires that were started near to us, but plenty more burnt to the ground. As people started to leave on Monday morning I was genuinely shocked at the number of tents that had been abandoned. Although a good number of them were slashed or burnt, on our campsite we collected around 200 undamaged tents and loads of sleeping bags, mats, air beds, plastic plates and cups (not to mention several crates of abandoned beer).

Leeds Festival could do more to encourage recycling, but I think it's a case of gradually changing the attitudes of the minority who go around trashing stuff on the last night. Being a Green Messenger was a brilliant experience; I had a great time and met some fantastic people, who by the sounds of things are all well up for doing it again. Hopefully with schemes like this Green Messenger one, the message will start to get across. See you next year guys!