REGULAR
SETTING THE BENCHMARK
In this month’s ‘View from the BCC’, Lee Baker, PR & Media Manager for the British Cleaning Council, turns his attentions to the ongoing European Championships, and the positive impact that one French stadium in particular is having on the environment.
Football fans are in heaven this summer with the biggest ever European Championship Finals taking place in France, with 51 games being staged at 10 locations throughout Country.
The sport has never been more popular across the globe and it is a powerful cultural phenomenon, which carries a significant social impact. The downside is that football, with its vast stadiums and thousands of travelling fans, does leave a huge ecological footprint.
The Championship’s organisers, UEFA, understand the need to address this and have published a report with guidelines to making the tournament as sustainable as possible. The 64- page document looks at areas such as social responsibility and at eco- measures like waste management, energy and water optimisation.
It also emphasises the need for sustainable stadium design, and there’s no better example of this than with the new 35,000 seater Allianz Riviera ‘Eco-Stadium’ in Nice, which generates enough energy to fully power itself.
The stadium, which opened in 2013, is a model of sustainable development which blends strong social and economic ambitions, and can host rugby, pop concerts, and is also home to a museum on French sports.
It is one of the world’s foremost Eco- Stadiums and has a roof which is embedded with 7,500 square metres
26 | Tomorrow’s Cleaning July 2016
of state-of-the-art, highly efficient solar panels, which can actually produce three times more power than is needed by the facility – making it a mini power plant of sorts.
It also has a system enabling it to exploit rain water, and a wall of propellers using winds from the Var plane for its air conditioning.
“Football is in a strong
position to be able to affect and influence people’s lives, and the Allianz Riviera stadium in Nice is a structure that should
inspire British clubs to ‘go green’ when redeveloping their stadiums.”
It’s located on the outskirts of Nice in the new urban development district of Éco-Vallée Plaine du Var, a showcase project for sustainable living and working, one of the many aims of which is to be CO2-neutral in the long term.
The French government places a great deal of importance on sustainability and has a carbon tax on fossil fuels, a ban on fracking, and, along with UEFA, has encouraged this stadium all the way from the first designs.
Living and working in a more sustainable way is something that most people agree on, but which often slips back off the agenda when other, seemingly more important matters arise. Having a fully functioning eco- stadium hosting such a prestigious football competition is a perfect way for the French to demonstrate how important this issue is to them.
Football is in a strong position to be able to affect and influence people's lives, and the Allianz Riviera stadium in Nice is a structure that should inspire British clubs to ‘go green’ when redeveloping their stadiums.
Most football clubs take their social responsibilities very seriously, but often are unsure how to influence supporters’ environmental behaviour. The message from the Euros in France is that it is possible to think in a more environmentally friendly way, if all stakeholders; government, local officials, sporting clubs, and private investors are pulling in the same direction.
So even before the tournament began it’s been a great result for the environment. Let’s hope the publicity surrounding the development in Nice can inspire fans and clubs to do the same here.
www.britishcleaningcouncil.org
twitter.com/TomoCleaning
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