Work at the service of artistic creation
Green transition issues are a reminder of the importance of intangible goods and the need to preserve living things. Art and culture play a major role in this process. The Lyon Opera is committed to defending bold artistic policies so new works can be created and the repertoire pieces performed.

Make shows accessible to all and reach out to audiences
The Lyon Opera strives for the arts to be accessible to diverse audiences thanks to special prices, free events, outreach initiatives aimed at people of all ages, and travelling shows devised to forms connections with a variety of places in Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes – theatre houses, hospitals, schools, retirement homes….
The Lyon Opera is also active in the health sector and is committed to a 3-year project conducted with the Hospices Civils de Lyon.

Work with artists with similar values on life
After Mycelium by Christos Papadopoulos, on tour this season, or the next Opera on the Road, Le Sang du glacier and the new Maîtrise production, L’Avenir nous le dira, other artists will keep on bringing their own viewpoints to fuel collective imagination and build a sensible future.

Contributing to changes in the system
The network’s fields of interest include the life cycle of productions, the number of performances, the development of new forms…
The Lyon Opera is prepared for such challenges, as it permanently benefits from artistic forces and design studios (set and costume) allowing year-round creation and reprises of existing repertoire pieces, whether in Lyon or on tour, thus extending the life cycle of productions. The Opera is also part of a network to jointly fund new productions with other opera houses, ensuring several performances at the European level.

Coming up with alternative production methods: green set design and circular economy
As a member of the Collectif 17h25, the Lyon Opera has been carrying out a pioneer research and development project since 2022. Revolving on the standardization of set components, the project’s main goals is to reduce the carbon footprint generated by set building and transportation.
Our teams are also careful to reuse existing set pieces and take part in the cultural recycling project implemented by the Métropole de Lyon. They will soon experience with natural dye for the costumes.

Spread awareness and train staff and guest contractors
The Lyon Opera is committed to spreading awareness and train its staff as well as guest artists so that professionals can contribute to change as a community.

Work towards new ways to move
A recent study on the audience’s modes of transportation led the Lyon Opera to engage in discussions with local cultural actors and mobility experts in order to improve transportation and provide new options in that field. We are adamant that the transportation of artists and productions must be tackled by a network of cultural actors. Consequently, the Lyon Opera takes part in devising shared criteria in this regard.

Energetic performance of our facilities
Thanks to real-time measurement, the Lyon Opera has implemented specific solutions to control and reduce its water and energy footprints: we programmed our systems, replaced over 90% of our lighting in favour of LED, improved our air handling units… Since 2020, these measures have already led to a 37% drop in energy consumption – and our goal is to reach 50% by 2030.

Reducing waste
This season, 90% of recycled waste is dealt with in accordance with current regulations thanks to special equipment provided with relevant information, allowing a major reduction of non-recycled waste.

Green purchasing
The Lyon Opera reinforced the implementation of carbon and CSE criteria on various markets to change its purchasing policies and ensure ethical collaborations with all our service providers.

Digital sobriety
The Lyon Opera has vowed to track its digital carbon footprint and set up a plan to limit it through several measures, including sustainable management of IT and phone infrastructures, improvements of digital documentation use, better control over stored data and reasonable use of digital communication.

The Lyon Opera’s green policies are constantly evolving and feeding from the networks we are part of: the Collectif 17h25 for green design; the Agora Lyon 2030 – an advisory council which gathers organizations to work towards a project of making Lyon a carbonneutral city by 2030 – ; the Convention des Entreprises pour le Climat (Business Climate Convention) that helps companies question their economic models; and the Augur Labs Numérique responsable program.