REPORTS
GREEN SCREENS: SUSTAINABILITY IN EUROPE’S SCREEN INDUSTRIES
DR KATE MOFFAT
This report examines Europe's leading sustainability programmes through a verified, data-led lens. What the evidence reveals is not a uniform transition but the rise of two complementary models of change:
A top-down regulatory approach centred in the DACH region, where compliance is built into funding conditions and professional standards.
A bottom-up, data-first movement led most notably by France, where more than 10,000 carbon assessments have now been completed, producing the world’s largest dataset on audiovisual production emissions.
A quiet but consequential shift is underway in European filmmaking. Environmental considerations—once seen as optional, expensive, or symbolic— are increasingly being built into the operational frameworks of production. This evolution is being shaped by a combination of environmental urgency, publicfunding requirements, and emerging policy design. Yet despite clear momentum, widespread adoption is still emerging, and the available data, while robust in certain regions, remain uneven across the continent
This report examines sustainability policy and practice in the European film, television, and streaming industry at local, state, and EU levels. It explores policy support for institutionalizing these practices and offers solutions to fill policy gaps. Connecting policy and practice, the report aims to make green film production an active agent for positive change.
Addressing funding, production, and reportage phases, the report provides three key recommendations:
Greening European Film Policy: Towards a Sustainable EUropean FIlm and TV Industry
1. Minimum Standards:
Establish standardised sustainability expectations and norms, from development-stage planning to on-set baselines, for both publicly-financed and commercial productions.
Adopt mandatory financial investment schemes for all productions, including incoming mobile productions and international co-productions, to link financial incentives with verifiable reductions in environmental impact.
2. Finance
Introduce third-party auditing and certification focused on exceeding minimum standards, directly tied to financial incentivisation.
3. Auditing
Sustainable Digitalisation: Ensuring a sustainable digital future for UK film and television
A new report by the Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy, authored by Hunter Vaughan and Pietari Kääpä, examines sustainable digital practices in the UK film and television industry. It highlights the environmental impacts of digitalisation and calls for frameworks and policies to promote eco-friendly practices and encourage positive industry change.
The report examines the impact of digitalisation on the industry's environmental footprint and social practices.
DIGITALISATION AND SUSTAINABILITY
Identifies mechanisms for positive change and recommends policy actions for sustainable digital practices.
GOVERNMENT AND INDUSTRY LEVERS
Highlights the significant carbon footprint and waste production in film and TV production, stressing the need for robust sustainability strategies.
ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT
BENEFITS AND CHALLENGES OF DIGITALISATION
Discusses the efficiencies brought by digital technologies and the difficulty in scrutinising their environmental impact.