Severn Screen: Making film production greener

About Severn Screen 

Severn Screen is a production company based in Cardiff, specialising in high end TV drama and film projects. Its recent productions include Craith/Hidden (S4C/BBC), The Pembrokeshire Murders (ITV), Apostle (Netflix) and Havoc (Netflix, due for release in 2023). 

Our Green Cymru Challenge Fund project grew out of our work on Havoc 

Cardiff based Severn Screen were lead producers on Havoc. I was brought onto the project as Environmental Steward, the first time Severn Screen had engaged a full-time person in this role. The company - along with Netflix and producing partners XYZ Films - recognise the importance of embracing more sustainable ways of film making – and working towards the Albert Sustainable Production certification. Everyone was committed from the outset to making Havoc as sustainable as possible. 

We attended an initial Green Cymru workshop when we were in the middle of shooting 

The timing of the Green Cymru Challenge was fortuitous, in that we were able to submit our application for R&D funding while still in production on Havoc. We saw an opportunity to document and analyse the work we did on Havoc, and to identify key learnings for use on future projects.   

Start by recording success… and failure.  

We made sure to create a comprehensive record - department by department - of all we did on Havoc. This way, we were better able to measure the progress we made, as well as the challenges we faced. We don’t have this opportunity on every production, but this created an effective starting point for reflection and learning. It also triggered conversations that are already informing approaches on our next project! 

As part of our work we created a number of presentation decks to showcase our learnings, and we look forward to sharing these with collaborators and peers in the coming months. We know that that there are many in the sector making important advances in terms of their sustainability. By working together, we hope that we too can play our part in building a more sustainable industry for the future.  

We realised how important communication, engagement and habit building are 

There are different ways to engage people and promote working together to create a better environment where everyone feels heard. As part of our work, we collected stories from people on set to help us understand how specific departments work and how they approach the challenge of reducing their carbon footprint. 

Understanding the context in which we are working 

Production doesn’t exist on its own. All our work sits within a wider context - political, societal, economic and environmental. Recognising that our efforts are part of a bigger picture - both here in Wales, but also globally - helps provide motivation and clearer focus for our work. 

Crunching numbers - understanding the data around your carbon emissions 

Productions generate huge amounts of data - we wanted to use this data to help us better understand our carbon footprint and help us make better decisions on future productions. It gives us the ability to make conscious decisions about the way we work, by better understanding the impact we have. The Green Cymru project gave us the means to analyse some of this data in a deeper way via a data analysis platform (Power BI). 

Identifying the areas of our work with the highest impact on the environment

The areas that had highest impact on our production were transport, accommodation, energy use, and catering. By collating data and using Power BI we were able to examine these key drivers in more detail.  We were able to look at different scenarios, and instantly see the impact these changes might have on our carbon footprint. It's a really useful tool that we are now hoping to use on future productions. 

Using data to shape new narratives 

The data analysis also allowed us to visualise the impact of our work, helping us to ‘see’ how the decisions we make could reduce our carbon footprint. For example, with accommodation, we would always seek to prioritise booking with providers who ran on renewable energy. This information was not always available, particularly with many privately rented apartments. But we were able to use the tool to show how, if we were to have booked all the accommodation in places that ran on 100% renewable energy, the scale of the impact it would have in lowering our carbon emissions. We are then able to use this data to engage with local providers. It helps show that we are taking this issue seriously too, and encourage property owners to switch to renewables to make their property more attractive for hire. 

Climate change can open new conversations around catering 

They say an army marches on its stomach. So does a film crew. On a big project like Havoc - feeding hundreds of people every day, catering can be a significant contributor to our overall carbon footprint. During production, we sought to engage the cast and crew in conversations around menu options to get them on board with why we’re making menu changes. We weren’t seeking to ban anything, but by informing people of the different carbon footprints of their meal choices we found many were more willing to choose lower impact food. We had posters placed around the studio and on location informing them about the climate impacts particular choices had, to reinforce this messaging. Our data analysis work as part of Maximising Havoc allows us to measure the exact carbon impact of making different meal choices. 

Food waste should not be wasted

When food waste goes into landfill, it releases methane into the atmosphere; methane is a greenhouse gas 84 times more potent than carbon dioxide over a 20 year period. We made considerable effort to make sure no food waste went to landfill. Working with a local farm which runs an anaerobic digester, we were able to turn our food waste into biogas and fertiliser. We put plans and systems in place to have all our food waste processed with them. Something with the potential to cause high carbon impact instead became useful; processing it meant fewer emissions released into the atmosphere and electricity could be generated from it via the biogas. As part of ‘Maximising Havoc’ we developed our learnings around food waste recycling into a slide deck that can be shared with other productions. 

We identified four areas that we might want to take further with more R&D 

There are so many opportunities to develop new ideas within the field of sustainability. We recognise that there is still much work to be done around awareness and empowerment, and of creating new narratives and infrastructure to support this work. The importance of having environmental teams present on set to drive this important work, to communicate sustainability messaging and encourage action is vital. There’s also potential to do more in developing and refining production processes and the infrastructure required to embed sustainability in all our work, particularly around waste management and waste disposal and the opportunities for the industry to develop a circular economy approach in this area.  And then there’s always room for more on-project data gathering and analysis… 

This project has shown that improving sustainability is a balance of heart and head 

You need clear, strategic thinking, careful planning, effective data analysis and comprehensive green supply chains. This is what the head calls for. But you also need to speak to the heart, which is where you need communication, engagement, empowerment. If we can get both working in tandem, we will make more progress, more quickly. 

We recognise that this is a journey 

In different parts of the industry, people are proactively thinking about how they can work in a ‘greener’ way. We hope that in the future, sustainability becomes a natural part of everybody’s thinking - from producers, stakeholders and suppliers, to the crew who work in the industry, many of whom want to see these changes happen more quickly. There are some real positives happening, but we must keep learning, keep asking difficult questions, learning from each other and sharing information.