Mission: Home's most ambitious year to date included debuting historic zero-emission festival stage, diverting 114K+ pounds of waste from landfill, and deploying 65 different environmental and community initiatives.
Following another sold-out edition in Downtown Miami on March 27 - 29, 2026, Ultra Music Festival has unveiled the results and impact from this year’s iteration of its award-winning sustainability program, Mission: Home. The program, now in its sixth year, reached new milestones — implementing a record 65 initiatives and further solidifying its position as one of the most comprehensive sustainability programs in the country.
Mission: Home has educated over 9.1 million people worldwide, diverted over half a million pounds of waste from landfills and donated more than 108,000 pounds of food, beverages and supplies back to the local community since its launch in 2019. The program continues to evolve each year, driving measurable change across partners, vendors, staff and fans alike.
A defining highlight of the 2026 program was Ultra’s battery-powered RESISTANCE Cove Stage, marking the first time a major U.S. electronic music festival has powered a stage with a zero-emission system. The battery system’s deployment avoided approximately 18,740 pounds of carbon emissions — equivalent to driving a car from Miami to New York and back 8 times. Delivered in partnership with REVERB’s Music Decarbonization Project, Showpower, and CES Power, Showpower’s SmartGrid™ battery system enabled full-scale stage production with flawless power performance, all without creating any onsite emissions throughout the festival weekend. Its success served as proof that large-scale festivals can embrace bold production innovation while helping shape a more sustainable future for live events.
Beyond this historic moment, Mission: Home continued to expand its waste diversion efforts, setting a new program high by diverting more than 114,000 pounds of waste from landfill this year, an increase of 5,000 pounds over the previous record set in 2024. The festival achieved this in partnership with waste management partner, Clean Vibes, and several community partners by implementing 9 different waste diversion streams. These included food, beverage, wood and supply rescue initiatives with donations to community partners, in addition to composting and recycling initiatives for glass, cooking oil, aluminum cans, water bottles, cardboard and hard-to-recycle soft plastics.
Ultra also debuted a reusable souvenir cup pilot in partnership with Red Bull designed to reduce single-use waste, replacing 4,000 disposable cups throughout the festival weekend. Since its inception, Mission: Home has eliminated more than 3.2 million single-use plastic items from the festival’s beverage service alone, in addition to countless others across food vendor and catering operations.
Local community impact remains at the heart of Mission: Home. Through its student volunteer program and long-standing partnerships with organizations like The Caring Place, the program has helped provide over 15 thousand meals to individuals in need while educating college students on large-scale sustainable event production and community giveback programs. Ultra’s onsite Eco Village also welcomes attendees to learn from local non-profit organizations through immersive educational experiences while taking in views of Biscayne Bay, live art and DJ sets on the Oasis Stage.
In 2026, Ultra also expanded fan engagement opportunities, including the launch of the Mission: Home Cleanup Countdown, an interactive initiative encouraging attendees to support Ultra’s “Leave No Trace” efforts in exchange for exclusive prizes. Additionally, the program continued its partnership with Fandiem to support Lotus House Women’s Shelter, offering fans the chance to contribute to a meaningful local cause while engaging directly with Ultra’s sustainability mission.
Pollution prevention and nature preservation efforts extend throughout and beyond the festival grounds, with initiatives like tree, vegetation, wildlife and storm drain protections. Additionally, the annual Making Waves shoreline cleanup, has collectively removed 4,305 pounds of marine debris from Bayfront Park. Online and onsite, Ultra also reinforced its Leave No Trace campaign through advanced attendee communications, signage and announcements on its Main Stage.
“Mission: Home has grown into something much bigger than a sustainability program — it’s become a platform to inspire action, build community, and demonstrate what can be achieved at scale.” — Vivian Belzaguy Hunter, Sustainability Director, Ultra Music Festival
As Mission: Home continues to evolve, Ultra Music Festival remains committed to using its global platform to drive progress both within the live events industry and beyond. From pioneering new technologies to expanding its ever-growing list of sustainability initiatives, Ultra is demonstrating that large-scale events can operate more responsibly without compromising the scale, energy or experiences that define live music culture.
ABOUT REVERB
REVERB is the music industry’s leading sustainability partner. For more than 20 years, the nonprofit has harnessed the cultural power of music to drive real-world change. Founded in 2004 by environmentalist Lauren Sullivan and Guster frontman Adam Gardner, REVERB has partnered with festivals, venues, industry leaders and hundreds of artists across all genres, including Billie Eilish, Dave Matthews Band, Lorde, Dead & Company, Tyler Childers, Tame Impala, Jack Johnson, and many more. Together with REVERB, they’ve greened thousands of concerts, mobilized concertgoers to take over 8 million climate actions, eliminated 4.6 million single-use plastic bottles, brought large-scale clean energy solutions to live music, and raised over $26 million for environmental and social causes. With its 360-degree model — from backstage operations and touring logistics to fan engagement and stewarding funds on behalf of partners — REVERB makes it easy for artists and the music industry to reduce their footprint, while amplifying their collective voice for a healthier planet.
ABOUT SHOWPOWER
Showpower designs intelligent, sustainable energy systems for the world’s leading live events. Working with international festivals, stadium touring artists and global productions, Showpower combines advanced energy monitoring, system design and its modular SmartGrid battery storage technologies to optimise power use and reduce reliance on fossil-fuel generators. From demand modelling and system architecture through to implementation and onsite energy management, these systems enable complex live productions to operate with reliable, efficient and increasingly low-carbon power while accelerating the industry’s transition toward emission free, battery-led and grid-integrated energy solutions. Showpower has consulted on and delivered energy systems for globally recognised artists and events including Coldplay The Music of the Spheres World Tour, Above & Beyond, Global Citizen Festival New York and Belém, MDLBEAST Soundstorm, Lollapalooza Chicago, Lollapalooza Berlin, and Netflix Is a Joke Festival, among many others. Showpower is helping build the clean energy infrastructure that will power the next generation of major live events and productions.
ABOUT CES POWER
CES Power has been a leader in the Festival and Event industry for years providing Top-Tier Power generation solutions for all types of Festivals, Concerts, Tours , sporting events and live broadcasting worldwide. With a team having more than 25 years of experience powering the Vision of our clients providing excellence and reliability for all their events.
