Top Sustainable Venues in The Hague; Greener and Better than ever!
20 January 2023
Sustainability. A global movement that people and organizations strive to contribute to for the good of society and our collective future. It is imperative that sustainable efforts are organized and collaborative if we want to make an impact on curbing climate change.
The Hague: A sustainable city
The Hague is known globally as the city of Impact, Peace and Justice, making it a hotspot for international events in Europe. Early on The Municipality of The Hague recognized the importance of adopting sustainable processes and solutions. Wanting to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 95% before 2050. This had a knock-on effect as many venues are also committing to work towards combining their efforts to become a climate-neutral city. After all, sustainability is a long-term investment into, not only our businesses and industries, but also the next generations and our planet as a whole.
Events can have a large waste footprint, which is why The City of The Hague encourages businesses operating in the industry to live up to the growing sustainability standards. Subsequently, many venues in The Hague have already integrated sustainable practices into the DNA of their business. Some venues have even obtained certain sustainability certifications like the Golden Green Key Accreditation to maintain certain standards and legitimize their sustainable endeavors. A lot of these efforts can go unnoticed, as they are either not marketed enough or avoided as they don’t want be seen as ‘greenwashing’ their business. We thought it was important to look beneath the hood of The Hague’s venues and highlight what our green city has to offer. We approached some of the venues in The Hague to see what their opinions were about the movement, what sustainable practices they have adopted, and what they hoped to see in the future.
Louwman Museum
The Louwman Museum enables their visitors to step into the history of automobiles, but it is also a well-known venue for events of any type or size. With its unique atmosphere the museum sparks inspiration and ensures a one-of-a-kind event experience. From the very beginning, the venue implemented a variety of actions to cut back on their energy consumptions and directed their finances towards a thermal energy storage system and solar panels installed onsite. This was crucial as they require the energy to maintain a certain climate within the museum, to safeguard the quality of their museum pieces. Their climate actions reach from green catering over to hosting sustainability-driven events, but afterall their focus lies on internalizing the importance of sustainability within their business and themselves.
Fokker Terminal
The Fokker Terminal is a highly sought-after conference and event centre and was named a ‘Co2-neutral venue’ in 2019. The venue is investing time an money in exploring new ways on how to become as green as possible. Alongside the municipality the venue is currently researching how geothermal energy can be implemented into the event industry. It is their goal to rely on 100% self generated energy, while being a successful larger-scale venue in The Hague Area.
Madurodam
Madurodam is a must-see location for people visiting The Hague. This spectacular tourist attraction is famous for being the miniature city of the Netherlands and hosts around 250 events per year. One of their main focuses is giving back to society and they do so by contributing to social causes that help the most vulnerable of our society. Children. Giving back to society also means investing into our future, which is why the venue reinvented their approach to sustainability by installing solar panels, charging stations for electric cars, using environmentally fiendly cleaning products and more.
World Forum The Hague
World Forum The Hague is an accredited and certified venue perfect for larger-scale events with over 50 years of experience in hosting and organizing events. Making sustainability one of their focus areas meant taking steps toward making their facilities more future-proof. To ban plastic and install tap water stations instead. In addition, they installed a green roof with solar panels and offer their clients more climate friendly hybrid event solutions.. Their next goal is to become 100% paperless to further reduce their waste.
Amare
Amare is the newest theater and conference center in the heart of The Hague and the building plans was developed with attention to reducing its impact on the environment. The venue hosts many features that iimproves its sustainability. From toilets being flushed with rainwater, to nest boxes for birds located on the greenroof and catering with a zero-waste policy, the action taken seem endless. No wonder the venues achieved a BREEAM-NL Excellent rating earlier this year.
Museon/Omniversum
Starting this year, science and culture museum Museon and movie theatre Omniversum joined forces to make a greater level of impact. Their latest presentation is One Planet, an impact centre for sustainable development, showing how we can create a more sustainable future. Their expositions address the United Nation’s seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and other relevant themes in society, such as food and fashion.
Museon-Omniversum’s clients are sure to have the most environmentally friendly experience possible when organising their events. The venue boasts a Gold Green Key certificate, which has recently been renewed and exemplifies their commitment to sustainability.
The sustainable sentiment is shared throughout all The Hague’s venues and it is inspiring to see all the efforts being made to make our planet a more sustainable place. We can learn a lot from their initiatives and they can of course learn from each other. We are eager to see what other sustainable innovations will be adopted in the future.
Get in touch!
Many of our partners are already taking important steps to reinvent the event industry in The Hague. Interested in finding out more about our partners? Get in touch with us via conventionbureau@thehague.com!