Greener events

How environmental factors and "ecological footprints" have become increasingly significant at the Olympics and other major sporting events

The environment is the third dimension of Olympism, according to the International Olympic Committee. It stands alongside sport and culture and the IOC now requires that the Games promote sustainable development. Like all excellent ideals, this is not easy to achieve.

The World Cup in Germany was praised by UNEP
for its ecological ideas and strategies

The sheer scale of major international sports events creates a series of challenges for every organiser that wants to minimise its impact on the planet. The actual contest itself may require only humble facilities, such as a playing field or a snow-covered hillside but, with hundreds or thousands of competitors, a similar number of media workers and many more spectators, the quantity of resources needed expands rapidly. In 1896 a total of 241 athletes competed at the first modern Olympics, held in Athens. In 2000 there were 10,000 athletes and another 16,000 media workers, let alone the hundreds of thousands of spectators.

The trick is to provide the infrastructure for this dense concentration of human endeavour without consuming an unsustainable quantity of the earth's resources. Foresight, innovation and a willingness to learn from the experience of others are key to achieving it.

There have been serious attempts to quantify the sustainability of major sports events after they have happened. A powerful approach is to measure its "ecological footprint", a technique invented in the 1990s that is being used increasingly by organisations of all sizes from governments to individuals, to assess their impact.

A landmark study by Andrea Collins and Andrew Flynn of the Centre for Business Relationships, Accountability, Sustainability and Society (BRASS) at Cardiff University, UK, assessed the footprint of the world's most prestigious domestic club football match, the FA Cup Final. Leaving aside the infrastructure, it focused on the travel plans and food consumption of the 74,000 spectators at the one day event. The conclusion should help organisers of all large events.

"One of the benefits of the ecological footprint is that it has revealed through this study the ability to isolate those consumption activities (food and drink and transport behaviour) and waste types that have the greatest impact on the footprint," they reported. In other words, the study has shown that what spectators eat and how they travel are crucial to the sustainability of a large event.

Word Cup venues in Germany collected rainwater from their
roofs to keep the playing surfaces in good condition

So has anyone taken this important lesson on board? The answer is yes and it comes from the same sport that the BRASS researchers studied. At the FIFA World Cup Germany 2006, the organising committee decided that there should be only one make and model of drinking cup available at the stadia and that spectators would have to pay a modest deposit for it. The aim was to give the "Cup of the Cup" a value in the eyes of the spectators, so that they would not discard it after a single use, but return it to retrieve their EUR 1 deposit.  The result was that the contribution of drinking cups in the waste stream was minimised and its disposal was controlled.

The World Cup organising committee also promoted more sustainable forms of transport. Every match ticket included a free 24-hour pass for public transport to the stadium and this proved extremely popular, with more than half of all spectators making use of it. Others were encouraged to walk, cycle or travel by coach. The head of the programme, professor Klaus Töpfer, hailed it as a success barely two weeks into the tournament. "There’s one conclusion we can already draw: the car parks have lost out, as they’re mainly only half full," he said. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) also praised the transport programme. "I’m convinced these ecological ideas and strategies can be adapted and further developed for future mass events, be they football or rock concerts," says UNEP director Achim Steiner.

One attraction of the strategies for reducing the impact of transport and food waste is that they can be developed later than the plans for building the infrastructure, although the earlier they are considered the better. While the FIFA World Cup Germany 2006 free travel ticket scheme worked well, earlier consideration could have produced an even more sustainable approach. "The London Olympic Games of 2012 are being designed for the venues to be accessible via public transport only," says Dr Calvin Jones, an economist who contributes to BRASS research. "But one can make even more ambitious plans so that spectators' entire journeys, from their homes to the venues, are by public transport, not just the final leg."

TOROC reporting to the IOC: The Torino 2006
Winter Olympics took many measures to
reduce the environmental impact of the event

His comment reflects the fact that planning for sustainability for all aspects of large events depends on looking at the bigger picture. Construction materials may be best sourced locally. Energy might be produced from renewable sources. Buildings could be appropriate for other uses when the event has finished and the crowds have disappeared. "Unfortunately there is no single approach that can be used for every event," says Jones. "Environmental impact modelling is very, very hard."

Nevertheless, there are many small steps that can be taken which are known to be beneficial. The Sydney Olympics is still remembered as the “Green Olympics” because the organisers took a broad view and then identified specific areas to address. The sites were not environmentally sensitive. Indeed, a former industrial wasteland was remediated. The Olympic Village was designed as the core for a new township where there are now 2,000 dwellings. They were powered by solar panels and had solar water heating installed to reduce energy demand.

Earlier, the Lillehammer Winter Olympics of 1994 had recycled the heat from the ice surface and used it to keep other areas at the venue warm. At Nagano in 1998, volunteers' uniforms were made using recycled materials. The crockery was made from apple pulp or potato starch so that afterwards it could be composted. The bobsleigh and luge tracks were cooled with a novel system which massively reduced the need for chemical refrigerants.

There is always room for improvement but the Athens 2004 Olympic Games came in for more criticism than others. Pressure group Greenpeace had previously set guidelines for the organisers and reported on them afterwards. It was not good news. "Greece has acted as if there was no past from which to learn, despite the good intentions expressed by the Athens 2004 Organizing Committee," was the damning verdict. Sensitive wetlands had been used to host a canoe course. Little had been done to harness solar power. Transport decisions had been poor.

On the other hand, some small benefits were created by the Athens Games. Over a million large bushes, 290,000 trees and a staggering 11 million small trees were planted throughout the Greek capital. Gas-fuelled, lower emission buses were used and now the same technology powers the city's entire bus fleet. The quality of the air and sea was improved.

Other lessons can be learned from the Torino 2006 Winter Olympics. Passive solar heating, rainwater drainage systems, special fabrics for stabilising soil on the slopes and the establishment of ecological corridors to allow wildlife to cross the area helped reduce the environmental impact of the event. The Games were also used to initiate environmental projects about the emission of greenhouse gases, procuring sustainable goods and services and assessing the impact of temporary structures, including stands.

Elsewhere, the roofs of the stadia for the FIFA World Cup Germany 2006 captured rainwater, which was then stored and used to keep the pitches in good condition. The City of Manchester stadium, which was built for the 2002 Commonwealth Games field and track events, has become home to Manchester City Football Club, ensuring it will be well used for decades to come and the club is to boost its environmental credentials further. It will build an 85m-high wind turbine in 2007 to provide all the power that the stadium needs.

Now that the environment stands shoulder to shoulder with sport and culture in the ideals of Olympism, there are many ways to give it the respect it is due.