Coldplay to harness audience electricity to power new tour

Future. Besides traveling eco-friendly and bringing biodegradable products to their Music of the Spheres tour, Coldplay plans to literally power their concerts (partly) with kinetic energy created by their fans dancing or riding stationary bikes. It’s an innovative push to make music tours more sustainable… and could provide a blueprint for other bands on how to make going green a good time.

Dance utility
Coldplay is getting creative to cut their tour’s carbon emissions by 50%.

• Venues will be outfitted with kinetic dance floors that can capture energy from dozens of people dancing per floor.
• There will also be energy-storing stationary bikes (at least 15) that can generate up to 200 watts of energy per bike.
• Bloomberg reports that all of the energy will be stored in a unique battery system, made up of 40 recycled BMW electric car batteries, that will hopefully power the whole concert.
• The band has also developed an app that lets concertgoers input how they came to the show — car, public transport, bike, etc. — and gets rewards for choosing more green options.

Bassist Guy Berryman said of the innovations: “That’s the way it will bed in, if people see it less as a sort of onerous responsibility and more as a kind of opportunity to do something fun and it’s a benefit to the environment and to the whole concert experience.”

No-emission encore
Coldplay isn’t alone in putting together a more sustainable touring ecosystem.

• Billie Eilish is eliminating single-use water bottles from her concerts.
• Massive Attack is traveling solely by train for their tour.
• All of Olivia Rodrigo’s merch is organic and made with sustainable dyes.

With Live Nation finding that 82% of concertgoers try to live a sustainable lifestyle, it’s no wonder that Coldplay’s Chris Martin calls going green a “good business model.