The Climate Balance of the Paris Olympics and Paralympics – how sustainable can such mega events be?
With the Olympics closed and the Paralympics just around the corner, let’s have a look at the climate balance of such events.
As the most watched event world-wide, the Olympics have significant signaling function and potential leverage. At the same time, they are not essential to our lives, they are leisure activities, and therefore should be scrutinized event more strictly regarding their social and ecological impact. The reasonable question at hand: can we afford these mega events on a warming planet, and if so, how?
The numbers: Paris 2024
Big sporting events such as the Olympic and Paralympic Games are increasingly committed to decarbonization. Paris claimed to radically reduce emissions in comparison to previous Games, one important factor in winning it the bid to host the 2024 Games. Its claim: to cut greenhouse gas emission in half in comparison to London 2012 and Rio 2016.
Measures such as cardboard beds, electric vs. diesel-fueled stadiums, using 95% existing infrastructure for venues, and an Olympic village without air conditioning were put in place to ensure sustainability. With transport, construction and games operations such as feeding and security for athletes and spectators being the biggest source of carbon emission, these are significant factors.
However, with August temperature having increased by 2.7 °C within the last 100 years since the last Olympic games in France, and a heatwave on the horizon for the period of the games, 2,500 temporary cooling units had to be installed to ensure athlete safety. In addition, many national teams brought their own cooling systems. Criticism also arose over negative impacts on biodiversity with parks that were paved over to build a media village, as well as a judge tower being constructed on a Tahitian coral reef for the surfing competitions. Finally, with Coca Cola and Toyota being two of the main sponsors, two big names in some of the most polluting industries might not be the most suitable poster children for the proclaimed greenest Olympic and Paralympic games in history.
With a goal to halve absolute carbon emissions in comparison to 2012 in London (ca. 3,3 million tons of CO2 emissions), Paris seemed to be on track (ca. 1,6 million tons of CO2 emissions). However, shortly before the games, they had to abandon this target. Throughout the process, it has also been criticized that it was never fully transparent how these emissions were calculated. The full report will only be available after the event, and it is to be seen how high the emissions really were. Future games will need to be stricter in meeting these goals. To ensure this, Brisbane 2032 will be the first host to be contractually obligated to be climate positive.
The Outlook
Many of the cities that hosted winter Games in the past would under current climatic conditions no longer be able to do so. In summer Games, the increased risk of heat waves threatens athletes’ and spectators’ health. The Tokyo Olympics were the hottest on record with 146 cases of heat-related illnesses among Olympic and Paralympic athletes. The impact of the climate crisis does not spare the Olympic festivities and requires a rethinking of such events to at least not contribute to further heating.
With the current model, many of the spectators travel from overseas, accounting for 80% of the event’s emissions. According to researchers from the University of Lausanne, the emissions standards of the Paris agreement can only be kept if no new constructions are planned and the number of international travelers will be significantly reduced, privileging local spectators. "First, greatly reducing the size of the event; second, rotating the Olympics among the same cities; third, enforcing independent sustainability standards," – Martin Müller, Unil Lausanne
Going forward, the IOC needs to urgently adopt quantifiable emissions targets and ensure they are implemented. With the world watching, future Olympic and Paralympic Games will serve as critical testing grounds for determining whether mega sporting events can be aligned with a fossil free future.
Sources:
https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/how-the-2024-paris-olympics-fast-tracked-decarbonization/
https://www.climatecentral.org/climate-matters/paris-100-years-olympic-warming#
https://olympics.com/en/paris-2024/our-commitments/the-environment/carbon-method