Lean green disco machine

With a population of under one million, you might not expect the Dutch city of Rotterdam to be at the centre of the music world. Yet it has become something of a mecca for "green clubbing", and it may well be an initiative that clubbers worldwide should be paying attention to. International sustainability organisation Enviu has joined forces with architects Döll - Atelier voor Bouwkunst to create the Sustainable Dance Club concept.

Working with scientists at the Technical University in Delft, Holland, and a range of commercial and technical partners, the team aims create a club with a “regenerating” dancefloor (right) that harnesses energy from clubbers jumping up and down, toilets flushed completely with rainwater and clubbers' sweat (naaaasty), light fixtures on the wall that are powered by “human heat” and plenty of “biological” beer (like what kind of biological? Gulp…)

The project will mix this technology with more common green energy like wind turbines, solar energy, LED lighting and smart “energy saving acoustics”. Will they succeed? Only time will tell… but they kicked off the concept with the Critical Mass club night in Rotterdam in 2006 (right), which will be followed by an upcoming event in Amsterdam that will see the launch of "Trees for Dance", where you can calculate your CO2 “dance foot print” and help pay for the planting of trees that will compensate for your hedonism.

Hopefully the successful implementation of this concept will spark something much bigger… and with the amount of energy spent clubbing worldwide on any given night, it is clearly a concept that global clubbers could get in the groove for.