Environmental impacts of events

The events industry has registered continuous exponential growth in the past decade, creating significant benefits in terms of socio-economic development and employment, which are now at stake following the current global pandemic destinations are experiencing. However, such growth in event industries have raised questions in relation to the carrying capacity of host destinations in light of the increased stresses and pressures that events have begun to place on the environmental resource base of host destinations. It is the visual and physical environmental implications of event activities that have begun to draw attention to the way events and more specifically, to the way event impacts are planned and managed, which now commands attention. This chapter presents insight into events and environmental impacts stressing the importance of monitoring, measuring and managing impacts. A categorisation of environmental impacts is presented in this chapter and a critical overview of five adaptable management approaches including environmental impact assessments (EIA), strategic environmental assessments (SEA), models for sustainable event management, global criteria and indicator systems is presented. Such approaches may potentially aid the transition towards greater levels of sustainability in the process of planning for environmental impacts of events.