Overview
Northern Ireland’s screen sector is an important contributor to the region’s economy and creative industries, attracting major productions and developing an international profile. Through its Stories, Skills and Sustainability strategy, Northern Ireland Screen is working to embed environmental sustainability into production practices towards a more consistent, industry-wide approach.
Challenge
Major film and television productions operate under demanding schedules, with large crews, temporary facilities, location-based filming and complex supply chains. These conditions create a challenging environment to integrate sustainability consistently.
Three key challenges are:
- High material consumption and disposal: Set builds, props and production assets risk becoming single‑use waste rather than circulating resources
- Catering and food waste: Servicing hundreds of cast and crew across multiple locations generates daily surplus and organic waste
- Intensive energy demand: Reliance on carbon‑heavy temporary diesel generators to power equipment, basecamps and lighting on location
Approach
To address these challenges, Northern Ireland Screen and production leads implemented a practical, hands‑on sustainability model:
- Embedding the circular economy: Production workflows integrated reuse, recycling and resource recovery across departments to reduce material waste and keep assets in circulation
- Preventing food waste: Production teams introduced measures to prevent surplus catering and divert organic waste through a partnership with Olio with all scripted productions required to join the platform
- Clean green energy: Operations shifted from conventional diesel to hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) as the primary fuel for scripted production across NI Screen facilities, fleet, generators, forklifts, telehandlers and on‑site machinery
- Measurement and accountability: All productions (except interactive content) must use BAFTA Albert’s carbon calculator to measure and track emissions, creating a consistent baseline for improvement
- Financial and advisory support: The NI Screen's Sustainability Support Scheme offers productions financial support - £3,500 is provided to help access a Sustainability Adviser for 10 days' support, hybrid generators, recycling facilities, EV charging points, battery power and solar alternatives
Outcome
Northern Ireland Screen’s sustainability programme has established a framework for addressing emissions, food waste and material use across supported productions.
While production‑level carbon and waste data are still being compiled and verified, the structural changes themselves represent significant achievements: the UK‑first HVO mandate, the mandatory Albert carbon calculator and the Olio partnership. Northern Ireland Screen aims to publish quantified reductions in carbon emissions, fuel consumption and waste diversion based on these assessments.
Why it matters
Northern Ireland Screen’s approach brings together resource efficiency, food redistribution, alternative fuels, carbon measurement and financial support. These measures offer useful lessons for other productions and for businesses facing similar challenges around temporary operations, energy use, procurement and waste.
Although film and television production has specific operational requirements, the underlying principles are relevant across many sectors:
- understand environmental impacts
- measure performance
- prevent waste
- make better use of resources
- adopt lower-carbon alternatives
