Understanding Sustainability

Whether you’re new to producing, or just new to sustainability, understanding the foundations of climate change and sustainability training is a good first step in environmental action.

Getting Good (at Sustainability)

Kickstart your sustainability knowledge by taking one of the several free production sustainability courses offered in Canada.

Our industry offers a wealth of free sustainable production training resources designed to equip you with practical skills for reducing emissions and waste. These courses delve into essential sustainability concepts, such as circularity, resource efficiency, and mindful consumption, providing you with the tools to integrate eco-friendly practices into every stage of production.

A great place to start is the sustainability fundamentals training from Reel Green and the Sustainable Film Production Fundamentals Training (facilitated or self-directed) from Ontario Green Screen.

Reducing pollution and environmental harms requires understanding how it's being caused in the first place.

If you want to brush up on your climate literacy and science, there are countless resources online that you can visit if you want more information. Here are some of our favourites:

Environment and Climate Change Canada has an introductory video on Climate Change, and NASA has great resources on the current state of our planet’s system.
We love the Climate Atlas of Canada, the Canadian Climate Institute and Carbon Brief (for their Fact Checks & Explainers), and the David Suzuki Foundation (for their stories on social and cultural climate issues).

Carbon Literacy: Movie Edition!

The sources of emissions from movie production is roughly the same across all types of budget and genres. A recent study commissioned by Telefilm looked at 22 Canadian feature films, scripted and factual series. From this they developed an estimate that the emissions for Canadian-funded productions average out to 28t CO2e per hour of content. (Telefilm) The average Canadian is estimated to be responsible for 15 t CO2e per year (Statista), by comparison. The specifics can vary by genre, but in general the main environmental culprits are: ‍

Travel And Transportation. Moving people and equipment by road and by air using traditional fossil fuel burning vehicles accounts for between 40%-60% of a production’s footprint. ‍

Powering Production: Emissions from heating, cooling and powering our equipment and sets add up to between 10%-30% of a production’s footprint. This covers everything from generators, anything you have to plug in, and the batteries in your camera.
Materials Waste: All that stuff we buy, make and then throw away, particularly food waste, plastics and other materials sent to landfills, contribute between 20-25% of a production footprint.

As you start to examine your productions to find ways to be more sustainable, the above categories are excellent places to start. Get into the habit of examing your fuel budget, questioning travel plans, and how much you need to rent or buy to make your film.

Key Terms

As we continue to dive into sustainable content creation, here's a list of foundational terms and concepts that you may run across in this guide and elsewhere.

Carbon Footprint

A measurement of the greenhouse gas emissions caused directly and indirectly by an event or production. It is expressed in units of carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2e) and includes all GHGs emitted throughout the lifecycle of the product or activities being assessed.

Circularity

Circularity, or a circular economy, reuses materials and minimizes waste. In green film production, this means renting or reusing props and costumes, recycling, and proper waste management. To practice circularity, consider the end-of-use state for every purchase. Can it be reused, donated, or resold? Think about sourcing items that have a second, third, or fourth life (e.g., renting vs. owning, buying secondhand, borrowing).

Climate Action

Actions taken to combat climate change and its impacts. In the context of the film industry, this can involve initiatives to reduce carbon footprints, improve energy efficiency, and promote environmental storytelling.

Climate Change

Refers to a significant change in Earth’s climate and weather patterns, persisting over an extended period of time (hundreds or thousands of years, or longer). Current climate change is believed to be occurring as a result of human activities.

Resource Efficiency

Resource efficiency in low-budget film production is about getting the most mileage out of your resources (people, time, materials, power, etc) . This includes careful planning, using energy-efficient equipment, and sourcing local labour and resources to reduce environmental impact and save money.

Greenhouse Gases (GHG) / t CO2e

Greenhouse gases (GHGs) trap heat in the atmosphere. Human activities such as fossil fuel consumption, deforestation and agriculture, increase GHG levels in the atmosphere, driving more climate change. “Carbon dioxide equivalent” is a standard unit for counting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions regardless of whether they are carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), and fluorinated gases. This is expressed as ‘tonnes (t) of carbon dioxide (CO2) equivalent (e), or “t CO2e").

Net-Zero (Emissions)

A goal to completely negate the amount of greenhouse gases produced by reducing emissions as much as possible, and negating the remaining balance through equivalent offsets, or carbon credits.

Sustainability

Sustainability in the context of this guide means meeting our own needs without compromising the ability for future generations to also meet their own needs. It covers human, environmental, social and economic concerns that impact an individual’s ability to live and thrive. Sustainability calls on us to be more mindful of what we consume, buy, and ultimately throw away.

Sustainable Production

The integration of environmental, social and economic principles and actions into film productions – from script to screen, in a way that reduces consumption, waste and all forms of pollution.

Systems Thinking

Systems thinking in green film production means understanding how different parts of the production process affect the environment. Decisions in one area can have ripple effects on others, like location choice affecting driving distances and therefore fuel costs and transportation emissions. We go into the different stages of production in the next chapter.

Understanding Sustainability

Getting Good (at Sustainability)

Carbon Literacy: Movie Edition!

Key Terms

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