As the public becomes more aware of the environmental issues facing the world today, sports facilities are beginning to turn to more environmentally friendly practices. Major sports events use energy, emit greenhouse gases, and produce huge amounts of trash. For example, a single college football game can produce 23 tons of waste. The 2006 Super Bowl in Detroit produced 500 tons of carbon dioxide from transportation and utility usage. The 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens produced half a million tons of carbon dioxide in two weeks.
About 16 million tons of carbon dioxide is emitted into the atmosphere every 24 hours by human use worldwide, and the United States is the single largest emitter of this greenhouse gas. Although Americans make up only 5 percent of the world’s population, we consume 26 percent of the world’s energy, spending about 440 billion on it annually. Energy consumption is only expected to increase. At this rate, about 30,000 lives are cut short in the U.S each year due to pollution from electricity production. The following explores existing options for sports facilities to become more environmentally conscious.
http://www.solarenergy.org/resources/energyfacts.html
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle (m)
Water Efficiency (m)
Stormwater Management (m)
Renewable Energy (m)
Carbon Credits, Renewable Energy Credits, and Carbon Offsets (m)
Transportation (m)
Lighting (m)
Heat Islands (m)
Brownfields (m)
LEED (m)
