Sustainability

As a conference, we are not climate neutral. However, we lower our impact on the environment as much as possible, Inspired by the 8 R’s: Recycle - Refuse - Reduce - Reuse - Repair - Regift - Recover - Rethink. We welcome feedback on how to improve. Here are our current initiatives:

Venue

• We look for venues that are easily reachable by public transport.
• We provide shuttle buses between the hotel and the venue. For those who are up to it, we provide the option to rent bikes at our cost at the hotel, to take the 15min bike route to the venue.
• Our conference venue, the Meervaart, is improving sustainability, by using solar panels, clean energy, energy-efficient heating & air treatment, and more.
• Our speakers hotel, the West Cord Fashion Hotel, focuses on sustainability and has a Green Key Label

Catering

• Our buffet is 100% plant-based. Vegan options are also standard available.
• We closely estimate our food amount through a careful headcount to minimise waste. We create awareness with our attendees to not throw away food. Our catering-partner donates the leftover food, where hygienic requirements allow, to a local charity.
• Drinks are offered in porcelain and glassware. We provide water bottles with tap water.
• We discussed thoroughly with our caterer the use of reusable plates. However, for this year, we are not able to provide all of our food on reusable plates. Where needed, we will use 100% biodegradable disposables that compost within 90 days and therefore meet the EN13432 standard. Of course, the sustainable use of disposables depends on a good collection and recycling.
• We provide bio straws.
• We use recycled napkins.

Recycling

• During the conference we optimize waste processing and recycling. We have separate trash cans with bio compostable garbage bags, for all compostables. We also have separate paper bins.
• We reuse leftover swag as marketing materials.
• We donate leftover paper and banners to companies who repurpose them.

Logistics

• We decided not to give away totebags each year. We alternate between paper bags and totebags.
• Our T-shirts are 100% bio cotton.
• We work with suppliers that print without chemical ink.
• We wash and reuse materials such as staff shirts, lanyards, ...
• We order recycled paper: stickie notes, program booklets, ...
• As a speaker gift, we invest in trees for a agroforestry project and build further on our growing DDD Europe-forest year by year.

Waste

• We try to avoid waste. We measure the waste we produce, so we can improve this yearly.

Travel

• We're a remote-first company, and use public transport where possible.
• We book travel for our speakers so we can offer more sustainable alternatives (such as trains) instead of flights. For DDD Europe 2023, thanks to the effort of our speakers and staff, 50% is coming in by flight, compared to 75% in DDD Europe 2022. (Usually the flights are booked because of the long distance or intercontinental travel).
• We encourage our participants to come by train if possible. Amsterdam has good train connections to Brussels, London, Paris,...
• We inform our participants about carpool-options.
• We carbon offset the flights we book yearly. Here you can find here the Certificate for Offsetting a previous edition's travel, by which we supported efficient cookstoves in Ghana to avoid deforestation.