5 . Issues such as global warming and sustainability have become passionate concerns for many of the concert industry’s fans and increasingly for the musicians. Coldplay, a pop band whose members scored their first big hit in 2000 with a song called Yellow, announced in November that it wouldn’t go on tour to promote its latest album, Everyday Life, until it could find a way to make concerts more sustainable and greener to the environment.

It’s not always easy to walk the talk. A growing number of artists, including Peggy Gou, have environmental demands built into their contracts when they tour, such as bans on plastic tableware. But there’s almost no way of avoiding carbon emissions produced by a tour, which involves moving hundreds of people and tons of equipment across large distances.

Lisa Pomerantz, who books travel for acts says that real change will require action by venue owners, concert promoters, and the fans. Major acts like Coldplay can afford to stop touring while figuring out how to lessen their environmental impact. But lesser-known artists can’t stay off the road, since streaming earnings haven’t been able to compensate (弥补) for the collapse in CD and downloaded music sales. Even when concerts are aggressive about being more sustainable, the impact of audience travel can easily swamp (淹没) their efforts. For bigger acts, this can represent as much as 80% of the carbon footprint, according to a 2015 study. Another analysis showed that roughly a third of the tour’s carbon footprint came from a venue’s power consumption.

Still, even the most green-conscious bands must balance their desire to be more sustainable against the financial necessity of touring. “I absolutely think you can go on tour and have a concern about the environment. It’s a matter of just keeping our carbon footprint as low as possible,” says Flavian Graber, lead singer of We Invented Paris.