Austin City Limits (ACL)
I’ve always been impressed with [TDS’] organization of recycling, composting and waste removal at ACL.
— Michael Hartman | CEO of Amy’s Ice Creams (ACL vendor since 2002)
Event Waste Disposal and Site Services Partnership
With more than 450,000 people in attendance over two weekends, Austin City Limits (ACL) attracts massive crowds and results in huge amounts of solid waste to clean up. C3 Presents, the promotion company behind the festival, sought new ways to prevent its waste from going to the landfill, and enlisted Texas Disposal Systems as a partner of the festival. Since 2005, TDS has been providing trash, recycling and composting solutions for the festival, as well as portable restrooms for concert-goers and mulch for Zilker Park in preparation of the festival. TDS also provides training to ACL vendors and food distributors to ensure the most amount of diversion from the landfill.
Drastic Improvement of Waste Diversion
In the years that TDS has been a partner of ACL, significant strides have been made in landfill diversion. TDS built a three-stream disposal system for the festival for solid waste, recycling and compost at every disposal site in Zilker Park. Containers for waste were accompanied by X-frame containers or additional containers to ensure all three waste streams would be accessible for festival goers. The waste was then collected and sorted at the fully integrated facility. With this system, ACL has drastically improved their diversion numbers. With both recycling and composting included, ACL diverted 53% (193.25 tons) of all waste by weight and 72% (5,914 cubic yards) of all waste by cubic yardage in at the 2017 edition of the festival. The progress over the past few years is staggering when compared to diversion rates in 2005, the first year that when TDS first started working with C3 Presents and ACL. In that year, the first year ACL began diversion, the festival diverted only 4% (6.91 tons) of all waste by weight and 6% (280 yards) by cubic yardage. Today, with new strategies and execution by TDS, that number is much different. Thanks to this partnership and the work from TDS, ACL now stands tall as one of the greenest music concert festivals in the country.
