Green Weddings 101
Why you should care about planning a more sustainable wedding
We love weddings, obviously! Yours will be one of the biggest days of your life. But whenever you’re throwing a big party, whether it’s for 20 guests or 250 of your nearest and dearest, you’re using lots of resources, emitting carbon dioxide, and creating waste in the process. Before you can really plan a sustainable wedding, it helps to understand what that even means. We’ve outlined the foundation of a wedding’s negative effect on the environmental to offer context for how all of the eco-friendly decisions you can make actually have an impact.
Do you know your wedding’s environmental footprint?
Every wedding has a measurable environmental footprint, driven by three key factors:
Your wedding produces waste. The vast majority of weddings aren’t thoughtfully planned to be waste-free – some waste is almost inevitable, whether that’s food waste, printed pieces, decor and favors, or wrapping paper for your many gifts.
Your wedding uses lots of resources. It takes a lot to throw an awesome party! The manufacturing of all the items used at your wedding, the gifts you’ll likely never use, and growing food and flowers all require raw materials, lots of water, and energy.
Your wedding produces carbon emissions. When you add it all up, the average American wedding produces over 15 metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2), a major greenhouse gas that causes climate change. That’s about the same as recycling 654 bags of trash instead of throwing them in a landfill! And, it doesn’t even include long-distance travel, which can quadruple that number.
Things like your guests’ travel (especially if they’re flying), your menu, flowers, invites and all of the little extras you buy to make the day perfect contribute to these impacts.
Every decision is important – each one makes your wedding unique! But those decisions also have a big negative impact on the environment. We’ll be honest: the CO2 you send into the atmosphere on your wedding day causes higher temperatures, extreme weather, and rising sea levels. Add it all up and you get ecosystems that are totally out of whack, which can cause problems for generations to come. And the waste and resources required fill our landfills and cause pollution as well.
The solution: plan for sustainability
To preserve our planet, we need to limit the amount of carbon emissions that go into the atmosphere and the waste we produce. Having an eco-friendly wedding is a conscious way to celebrate responsibly. It’s about more than climate change: when you make sustainable choices, you can also have a positive social and economic impact by using your dollars to support local, women and minority-owned businesses.
Your wedding is also an opportunity to spread the word about the importance of sustainability with your family and friends. Thankfully, people care now more than ever about making responsible choices, but they’re still learning how to be more sustainable. Lead by example, and share your choices to inspire and inform others!
It’s still okay to celebrate!
Feel like you’re suffering from sustainable choices information overload? You’re not alone on your green journey! Most couples don’t want to completely compromise on their dream wedding, and we’re not saying you should. Having an eco-conscious wedding is all about being informed so you can make choices about what matters most to you.
At the end of the day this is one of the biggest, most exciting days of your life – and probably the only time you’ll bring together all of your family and friends for such a happy celebration. Do what you can, but don’t lose sleep over it.
Whether you’re having a huge bash or an intimate gathering, Green My Wedding is here to help you minimize your environmental footprint, so you don’t have to stress. We help conscious couples by providing tips for planning a more sustainable wedding and offering green wedding packages to offset the rest. Learn more about how it works.
Ready for a deeper dive? Start by downloading 3 Big Decisions (and 5 Quick Wins) for a More Sustainable Wedding!