Amping Up Outside Care at Outside Lands

If you’re rocking out to Pearl Jam, Dave Matthews Band, and Jason Mraz at the Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival this weekend in San Francisco, the thirst you work up dancing might inspire a new appreciation for clean water. If so, chat up the folks from the Global Water Challenge while filling up your reusable water bottle.

GWC, along with 10 other green nonprofits, will be camping out in the festival's "Eco Lands" section. While there, you can also charge your cell phone with solar power, trade recyclables for merchandise, recycle your cell phone, and attend environmental talks.

In addition to the green-themed oasis, the festival incorporates a solar-powered stage, a farmers' market, and efforts toward a high waste-diversion rate to minimize the event's impact on Golden Gate Park and the planet.  A "passport program" further encourages sustainability by rewarding people who bike or take the bus to the festival, register to vote, or volunteer.

That's enough to make even those who'd rather hike than jam think, "Rock on."

--Sarah F. Kessler