Glastonbury clean up is 90% complete and a “massive improvement” says Emily Eavis

It comes after one of Glastonbry's greenest festivals in years.

The clean up after Glastonbury Festival 2019 is 90% complete according to organiser Emily Eavis who has described it as a “massive improvement” on the last.

According to The Guardian, this year’s clean-up is expected to be complete in 4 weeks thanks to the continued good weather. In 2017, it looks teams over 6 weeks to complete the clean-up operation.

On Tuesday, Eavis published a post on Instagram saying that this year, “93.3% of all tents were taken home” after analysing the results of an Ariel site photograph before and after the event.

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Eavis told The Guardian there was still work to be done in spite of the improvement. “Some of the worst offending campsites did still have several dozen tents left behind,” she said.

“Plus we still get camping chairs and air mattresses left behind, alongside standard rubbish – so things are by no means perfect yet.

“Sunshine is the biggest impact on the clean-up,” Eavis added. “When the weather is good, people also move around and place things in bins, and the whole waste collection operation runs far more smoothly and efficiently.”

Recycling at Glastonbury

Making a special appearance at the festival last week, David Attenborough praised the festival’s decision to go plastic free. “Now this great festival has gone plastic-free,” he said, “that is more than a million bottles of water have not been drunk by you in plastic. Thank you! Thank you!”

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As well as having a huge procession led by the environmental group Extinction Rebellion earlier in the week, Eavis also stated that the mission for Glastonbury in 2019 was to fight for a greener planet.

“This is the year. Climate is top of the agenda, and it needs to be the top of the agenda if we’re going to make some serious fundamental changes,” she told NME.

“We’re not selling plastic bottles this year. That’s the first mission that we’ve working on all year, and it is vast. If you want to buy water, then you can buy it in a can. I think most people will have reusable bottles so we’re not trying to sell more bottles, we’re just asking people to reuse them more. We’ve got water points everywhere you look. The first thing you’ll notice when you walk on site is that tap water is available everywhere. If you need to fill up, there will be a Water Aid kiosk wherever you are.”

She added: “I went to the Extinction Rebellion occupation of London with my kids, and I really wanted them to do something here. This is the perfect place for them to do something, because we’re essentially building a city and people need to come and live in it while being completely open-minded. People are open to changing the way they live when they re-enter the outside world. It’s a good place to campaign, join together, and send a message to the outside world?”

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