A climate-friendly Christmas market

‘Avoid, reduce, compensate’ is the motto the elves seek to adopt to help create a more sustainable Christmas festival, thereby consistently building on from their previous years’ work.

Various measures are taken to minimise energy consumption and ensure certified green electricity is used across the entire market. The CO2 emissions generated for market operations, setup and dismantling are compensated by virtue of trees being planted in co-operation with ‘Plant for the planet’. By the way: the ice rink at Heumarkt has already been able to call itself climate-neutral for several years.

Short transportation distances
By having a warehouse near the market and ensuring well planned logistics, we keep transportation distances short and, in recent years, have significantly reduced the volumes of fuel used.

LED lighting
We only use energy-saving LED lights to illuminate the ‘Heinzels Wintermärchen’ Christmas market.

Waste prevention
Our market restaurateurs and merchants primarily use paper napkins, and, where necessary, food is served in cardboard dishes with wooden cutlery. No disposable plastic cutlery is used.

Reusable system for cups and glasses
To minimise consumption emissions at the Christmas market, ‘Heinzels Wintermärchen’ does not use any disposable drinking vessels.

Waste separation
The elves separate their waste in co-operation with REMONDIS, so as to recycle as many resources as possible and avoid high emissions.

Sustainable timber
Only timber from sustainable forestry is used to build the stalls, bars and the ice rink.

Insulated refrigerant piping
To minimise energy loss, refrigerant piping was fitted as accurately as possible, and much of it also has insulated cladding.

Cooling mats
White cooling mats reduce the energy needed to keep the ice frozen.

State-of-the-art cooling units
The Aggreko electric cooling units used are based on state-of-the-art technology, and only provide cooling when necessary – similar to heated floors, only the other way around.

Professional ice maintenance
The ice masters from the ‘Lentpark’ run by KölnBäder GmbH maintain the rink regularly to ensure ice thickness is minimised, as this plays a big part in keeping energy consumption low.

Christmas trees
The Christmas trees on our Christmas market have their origin in a near-natural environment. 90% of the trees are rejects. This means, that they can’t be sold on a normal Christmas tree sale. After the Christmas market, the trees get shredded and composted. They won’t be burned but led back to nature in a natural way.

We see the annual emissions table as the centerpiece of our efforts towards a climate-neutral event. We have gathered the data for 2023 as accurately as possible. It serves as the basis for further measures and for calculating the necessary compensation actions. The CO2 emissions were determined in collaboration with the experts from Plant-for-the-Planet. Click here for the emissions table.
We use exclusively green electricity on the Christmas market, including the ice rink. The electricity comes 100% from renewable energy sources, whose generating plants are connected to the Western and Central European grid. The electricity can come from both hydropower plants and wind energy facilities, and it is traceable throughout the entire supply chain back to the producer. The strict quality criteria are certified annually by TÜV Rheinland. The use of green electricity as the main energy source at the event significantly impacts the CO2 emissions. This measure alone saves around 152 tons of CO2.
Heinzel’s Winter Fairytale is on the path to becoming a climate-friendly event with its measures. In the coming years, we will continue to work on reducing CO2 emissions. The emissions that we cannot or not yet avoid, we compensate through CO2-reducing offset actions. In cooperation with Plant-for-the-Planet, we plant trees that absorb CO2.
Trees absorb CO2. This simple fact fascinated the Heinzelmännchen so much that they decided to offset the CO2 emissions from Heinzel’s Winter Fairytale by planting trees. The perfect partner for this is the “Plant for the Planet” project, which was founded in 2007 by then 9-year-old Felix Finkbeiner. Today, “Plant for the Planet” plants native tree species on foundation-owned land on the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico, which can offset around 200 kg of CO2 over their lifetime. The 20 cm tall seedlings are cared for by local staff during the first 3 years until they can grow independently. The survival rate of the trees is an impressive 94%. In addition to planting trees, “Plant for the Planet” also trains children worldwide to become climate ambassadors, who then carry the young Felix Finkbeiner’s idea further into the world. The goal of the project is to plant 1 trillion trees to stop global warming. The little Heinzel are eager to contribute to this goal.

Interview with Rodney Ranz (Organizer of “Heinzel’s Winter Fairytale”), 2023

Mr. Ranz, last year you were confronted with an energy crisis – how do you assess the situation this year? Ranz: A year ago, we were concerned about not having enough energy, and the government called for energy conservation. Fortunately, the crisis has eased. With various measures, we actually consumed less energy last year than in previous years. We will continue to stick to this and further develop some of the savings measures. Can you give an example? Ranz: A particularly large energy-saving effect was achieved by a new electronic temperature control that we installed at different measuring points in the ice. This measurement allowed energy-efficient control, even leading to the temporary shutdown of the cooling units. However, the response to temperature changes was not yet optimal. We have been working on automatic control and hope for further savings from it. How much electricity do the market and the ice rink consume per visitor? Ranz: A visit to Heinzel’s Winter Fairytale consumes 0.165 kWh of electricity per visitor. That’s less than 1% of a German citizen’s daily consumption. It’s so little because the Christmas market is visited by many people simultaneously, and the consumption is shared by all. If you stay at home, you usually consume more energy. In addition, we have been using exclusively TÜV-certified green electricity, which comes 100% from renewable energy sources, for the Christmas market and ice rink for many years. And we have been climate-neutral for several years. What do you mean by a climate-neutral Christmas market? Ranz: A “climate-neutral Christmas market” is based on the idea that no CO2 is emitted by the event in the end. On the one hand, we need to find out which emissions can be reduced or avoided. On the other hand, the emissions that are still produced must be calculated via a carbon footprint and then offset so that, in the end, no emissions are released from a purely mathematical perspective. For us, calculating emissions and maintaining the energy balance is crucial. It is the basis for further efforts to reduce our emissions in the future. How do you ensure climate neutrality? We create a climate balance every year, where we calculate the CO2 emissions produced. In cooperation with Plant-for-the-Planet, we plant trees that absorb CO2, thus compensating according to the Gold Standard. To ensure annual overcompensation, we additionally support the project “A Forest for Cologne,” a joint initiative of the City of Cologne and the German Forest Protection Association Cologne e.V. to increase Cologne’s forested areas, as well as the “Climate-Saving-DIY” project, which​⬤