When my fiancée and I got engaged, we knew we wanted to celebrate our relationship in the company of our loved ones. As a climate journalist and a scientist interested in sustainability, we also knew we didn’t want our wedding to cause a lot of harm to the environment and climate.
Planning a wedding is fun, but it can quickly spiral out of control. Pinterest boards push dramatic tablescapes, Instagram says you’ve got to gather your girls in an exotic location for your bachelorette weekend, and your mom’s cousin’s girlfriend expects you to provide guests with disposable flip flops for dancing.
Weddings can be beautiful, fun, affordable, and environmentally friendly, but that doesn’t happen by chance. You have to commit to it. The average U.S. wedding generates roughly 56 tons of carbon pollution. That’s over three times the amount the average American produces in a year and almost nine times more than the global average per person.
In addition to climate-warming pollution, weddings generate a lot of food and single-use plastic waste — by some estimates, the average wedding generates 400 pounds of waste.
Kiira Portet is a wedding planner in Seattle, Washington, who began prioritizing eco-friendly wedding practices after working for a luxury planning company.
“I was just kind of bothered with how much stuff we were throwing away,” she said. “Like little bottles of bubbles, and just stuff. It was like, why are we doing this? This is about love and celebration and connection, and then we’re creating all this really gross trash.”
As Portet and other environmentally minded experts in the wedding industry know, planning a wedding that doesn’t pump climate-warming pollution into the atmosphere and that also doesn’t break the bank is totally possible.
Kaitlyn Holeman is a photographer and a member of Emerald Hour, a vendor collective in the Pacific Northwest that is dedicated to green weddings. Holeman said that it’s a good idea for a couple to make sure they are aligned on priorities and values before starting wedding planning.
“I think there’s a lot to be said for just taking the time to really just slow down, even from outside pressure of family or friends or anybody asking a million and one questions,” she said. “That alone can allow people to just breathe for a minute, be like, ‘Hey, do we really need this? Do we really want an event with 200 people there? Do we really need this extra thing that seems to be so trendy right now? Is that us?’”
Once you feel confident in your overall priorities, it’s easier to get into the details and figure out how to cut pollution and waste out of every part of your celebration, so let’s dig into a few tips.
1. Tighten your guest list
Perhaps the biggest and simplest way to reduce the environmental impact of a wedding is to keep the guest list short. Fewer people mean fewer flights, fewer meals, and a smaller space to heat or cool. Reducing your guest list can also save a ton of money.
But while the guest list might be the easiest way in theory to cut pollution, it can also be emotionally difficult. It’s definitely where my fiancée and I struggle the most, so I’m certainly not one to judge a big party.
If you’re struggling like I am, Portet recommends thinking about who you are excited to see and talk to. “Often at like a 150-person wedding, it’s just a one day,” she said. “And then you don’t actually have time to say hi or hang out.”
2. Pick a location where at least 50% of your guests won’t have to fly, and hire local vendors
The vast majority of carbon pollution associated with weddings comes from long-distance travel, and flying is a high-pollution way to travel. Reducing the number of people who have to travel by plane to a wedding can reduce the amount of pollution the party creates. And guests who do have to fly can choose direct flights.
Hiring local vendors can also help reduce travel-related pollution. Holeman said that photographers and videographers are often booked for out-of-town or destination weddings, but she has committed to reducing the amount of work-related travel she does.
“I’m no longer offering international weddings, even though I thought I wanted that,” she said. “And even here in the States, I’m really only trying to do out-of-state a few times a year.”
Choosing a florist who uses local flowers can also help you out in this category.
In town, guests can take public transportation, carpool, and rent electric vehicles to reduce pollution. My fiancée and I are excited that our wedding venue is located on a major bike path, and we’re trying to convince as many of our guests as possible to rent a city e-bike and bike to our wedding.
3. Consider meat alternatives and look into venues that compost
Food is a big source of climate-changing pollution. One way to tackle this impact at a wedding is to reduce the amount of meat served. A vegan or vegetarian party cuts pollution the most, but even offering chicken instead of steak makes a difference.
Portet said she recently worked with a couple who chose to have a full vegan buffet at their wedding reception.
“We’re so used to showing up at a wedding and having seafood or steak,” she said. “But it was really well done. The caterers were very intentional about that, and everybody still ate a lot of food and was very happy with it.”
As a bonus, vegetarian and vegan meals are also often cheaper than meat options.
It’s also important to consider what will happen to food after the meal, as food waste that’s dumped in a landfill creates methane emissions. Holeman recommends asking caterers or venues if they can compost food scraps after the night is over.
4. Choose a venue that is powered by renewable energy
Venues that use solar panels or other renewable energy sources for heating, cooling, keeping the lights on, and the kitchen running will produce less pollution than a gas-powered venue.
Supporting sustainable venues and even asking venue managers about their practices can help to show that there is demand for greener options.
“I do think that venues have the biggest ability to kind of shake up the industry,” Portet said.
5. Use rentals or thrift items for decor, clothing, and more
In terms of waste, renting decor, linens, and tableware can have a major impact on the amount of stuff that gets thrown out at the end of a wedding. Rentals can be more expensive than sourcing decor on, say, Amazon. But rentals often give couples access to higher-quality items and can contribute to a local, circular economy. My fiancée and I are getting some small decor rentals from our wedding planner, and Portet said some venues offer decor.
“Often they’ll have tables and chairs and a full decor closet with things that people have left behind that can be reused,” she said.
With rentals, you don’t have to throw everything away at the end of the night or take it home to post on Facebook Marketplace.
Decor or other items that can’t be rented can often be found on the secondhand market at a very affordable price. My fiancée and I had budgeted $4,000 for two brand-new wedding dresses. But you know what we actually spent on our thrifted dresses? $92.50 total.
I didn’t plan to walk out of the thrift store with a tags-on wedding dress in a trash bag, but I’m so glad I did! (Image credit: Samantha Harrington)
In the same vein, vintage and antique engagement and wedding rings can get you sparkle for a lower price, without causing additional environmental damage.
6. Talk about it!
Finally, as you go through this process, you can make an impact by talking about it! Share climate action commitments with planners, venues, guests, and with anyone who will listen. The best way to exponentially grow the impact of the climate action that you take in your life is to normalize it for other people.
Wedding planning can get stressful, so don’t forget that you don’t have to be perfect to make a difference. By making climate-friendly choices and bragging about them, you can help make more weddings climate-friendly.
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