Kilkenny’s Savour Food Festival is set to return from October 27-30 and the weekend is set to have most of its energy produced from bio-fuel, meaning that the festival’s sustainability will be even further enhanced this year.

Events on the scale of Savour depend on electricity from generators to power the festival and outside of the transport of visitors to festivals, diesel generators are the biggest contributor to carbon emissions of festivals.

Tipperary company, Event Power Ltd, have provided the electrical services to the festival for the last number of years and have a national reputation for providing energy services to major outdoor events.

Speaking about the making environmental changes at Savour, Festival Manager, Marian Flannery, said that they were delighted to be able to source and use bio-fuel powered generators to Savour Kilkenny this year thus eliminating the use of diesel. She said:

“We are very conscious of the festival’s huge efforts to have the lowest carbon footprint it can achieve. As a local community organisation, we are also conscious of our responsibility to ensure that the energy sources we use at our event are as environmentally sustainable as possible.

Biofuels utilise by-products from the food industry such as tallow and repurposed cooking oils to create a fuel proven to significantly diminish the reliance on fossil fuels across various sectors.

The bio fuel to be used at Savour 2023 is HVO – Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil – a diesel like fuel that can be produced without fossil resources by processing renewable waste lipids. We are delighted that our suppliers will use bio-fuels to replaces diesel which was traditionally used in power generation at Savour Kilkenny.”

Festival Chairperson, Ger Mullally, said that the festival committee are delighted with this step forward in its energy conservation:

“We are very happy that this change from diesel-powered generators and what it says about the environmental commitment of our festival. The fact that the oil used comes from the food industry obviously contributes to our long-standing farm to fork approach.

We will take action wherever possible to reduce our own carbon emissions and support a greener, more sustainable approach and using cleaner sources of power aligns with the Failte Ireland Festivals Climate action guidelines.

We are very conscious of the importance of environmental protection for the food sector. We have to play our part in ensuring that the rich food heritage of Kilkenny and the South East region continues for future generations. This switch from fossil fuels to renewable fuel is a new part our contribution to these values.”