"It's been head-spinning," said Levi Landis, executive director of the Philadelphia Folksong Society, which puts on the annual bash.
But the expected 30,000 attendees - including maybe 5,000 campers - have a hefty footprint any way you look at it.
Organizers have long encouraged recycling. Now they're asking people to sign a "no trace" pledge to leave the grounds clean.
Levi and others say all this is only, well, natural.
Folk music has long been associated with peace, justice, and environmental concerns.
After all, as Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, and so many others have sung, "this land is your land. . . ."
The fest's green momentum started to kick in last year, when the Giving Tree Band gave a grant to revamp the mailing list. By weeding out defunct addresses and encouraging e-mail sign-ups, paper usage dropped by a third.
The band, which is from Illinois and won't be on hand this year, has instruments made from naturally fallen trees, not logged ones.
"It's part of who we are," said the band's Todd Fink.
About the same time, Todd Henkin, 29, singer with the West Philly band Great Unknown, started pestering the festival management. It was his first time there, and he thought he would be more likely to return if it were greener.
"I started out a complainer," he said. Now he heads the fest's "green team."
A fellow greenie is Nic Esposito, 27, who has an urban farm in Kensington and is selling his book, Seeds of Discent - a word play on dissent and descent - at the fest.
Organizers said food vendors had to sign contracts agreeing to have compostable cutlery, cups, and plates.
