UEFA’S environmental own goal
EURO 2020 With matches spread over 12 countries and “less than green” choice of sponsors, Euro soccer body draws flak
PARIS: The 2020 European Championship will be the first to be played all across the continent, with 12 different countries hosting matches, forcing teams and supporters to rack up thousands of air miles and leave behind a gigantic carbon footprint.
Sold by UEFA as a one-off to celebrate 60 years since the first European Championship, the format of Euro 2020 may be innovative, and organisers have promised to make the tournament environmentally friendly.
That promise seems to ring hollow, however, when, for example, Polish supporters will have to travel over 6,000 km in 10 days to watch their team’s group games, to Dublin and Bilbao and then back to Ireland again. Matches will also be played by the Caspian Sea in Baku, nearly 5,000 km from London, where the final will be held.
Contrast that with Euro 2016, when the tournament was held in France, and the next Euro in Germany in 2024. Both of those countries are compact enough to travel around easily by train.
“This is a total nonsense from an environmental viewpoint,” Karima Delli, a French Green who chairs the European Parliament’s Transport and Tourism Committee, said.
“They say this new format is about showcasing European unity, but they’re forgetting that there is a climate emergency.”
However, UEFA insists it has taken this “emergency” into account and says it is “taking steps to ensure that Euro 2020 is our most environmentally conscious tournament to date.”
The format for Euro 2020 will see several leading nations— England, Germany, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands—whose fans “are known to travel in their tens of thousands for major international tournaments,” play their group games at home.
“This will significantly reduce the carbon footprint of the tournament,” UEFA said.
Meanwhile, Budapest’s Puskas Arena will be the only brand new venue for the tournament. This, UEFA says, has spared “a huge environmental cost in energy, concrete and other resources.”
In contrast, four new stadiums were built in France ahead of Euro 2016.
Andrew Welfle, of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of Manchester, admits that construction is “a major source of emissions” for any major tournament.
That means there is a “huge difference” between the emissions caused by Euro 2020 and, for example, the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, where all eight venues are either being built from scratch or modernised for the competition.
Emissions caused by travelling supporters can be “the hardest thing to calculate”, according to Welfle. “The estimates will be based on lots of different assumptions which will themselves be more or less realistic.”
UEFA itself has calculated that travelling fans and teams will produce 425,000 tons of carbon emissions over the duration of the Euro. In comparison, it says, Euro 2016 in France created 517,000 tons of emissions. The 2018 World Cup, held in 11 cities across Russia but with 32 teams instead of 24 at the Euro, produced almost 1.5 million tons of emissions, according to reports produced by organisers.
OIL MONEY
With sponsorship from carmaker Volkswagen and Azerbaijan’s state-run oil company SOCAR, Euro 2020 proves UEFA’S willingness to do business with companies whose environmental records are often less than exemplary. While UEFA claims the tournament will be the greenest ever, Volkswagen has been a sponsor of its international competitions since 2017, despite the scandal that broke in 2015 when it admitted to cheating on emissions tests on its diesel cars.
In addition, Russia’s state energy giant Gazprom has been the main sponsor of another major UEFA tournament, the
Champions League, since 2012. Critics say the ex-soviet oil and gas giants are not only extracting hydrocarbons in an unsustainable way and polluting the environment, but are also funding political regimes with questionable records on democracy and human rights.
Azeri sponsor SOCAR is the state-run oil company of the Caspian country ruled with scant regard for human rights by the Aliyev family since independence from the USSR. Russian gas monopoly Gazprom is one of Moscow’s main foreign-policy tools used by President Vladimir Putin to further the country’s political and economic interests, Kremlin critics say.
UEFA said that it is “conscious of the dilemma” presented by its closeness to SOCAR and Gazprom in terms of their environmental impact.
The logos of Gazprom and SOCAR will be hard to miss at the tournament, especially as they have strong links to two of the stadiums hosting matches.
The stadium in Russia’s northwestern city of Saint Petersburg is called the Gazprom Arena, although it will change its name during the tournament.
SOCAR poured “at least $850 million” into the stadium in Baku, according to the OCCRP, an NGO that works with investigative reporters in Eastern Europe.
COPENHAGEN DILEMMA
With the aim of going carbon neutral by 2025, Copenhagen faces a challenge as it prepares to host Euro 2020 matches—with the accompanying excesses—while minimising the climate impact.
With the tournament being spread over 12 European cities, fans will criss-cross the continent.
Those supporters will of course need housing, transport and food, all of which will contribute to their carbon footprint. “It’s always a paradox when you invite people to come to your city... of course it has an impact on carbon emissions and the environment,” Copenhagen’s mayor Frank Jensen said.
“We are focusing on how we can host a huge event with a lower carbon footprint,” added the 58-year-old Social Democrat who has run the city since 2010.
The Danish capital, which was designated the European Green Capital in 2014, is trying to do everything it can to make Euro 2020 as green as possible. Recycled cups will be used, organic food will be served, waste management will be used and the use of single-use plastics will be limited.
With the addition of UEFA’S promise to plant 50,000 trees in each of the 12 host countries to offset emissions, Copenhagen claims it will be able to limit the environmental impact of the four matches it will host.
Environmental concern is already well established in the Scandinavian capital and 40 per cent of trips are by bicycle.