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2006 Winter Olympics Games set new records in environmental sustainability
United Nations-backed efforts
to promote eco-friendly sports events won another gold medal today with the
release of a report showing that the 2006 Winter Olympic Games in Torino, Italy,
set new records in the quest for environmental sustainability in mass sports.
Some 70 per cent of greenhouse gases generated by the
games were offset by investing in forestry, energy efficiency and renewable
energy schemes both at home and abroad, according to the report released at the
Global Forum Sport and Environment in Lausanne, Switzerland.
“We are proud to have been associated with TOROC and
even more delighted at their successes,” UN Environment Programme (UNEP)
Executive Director Achim Steiner said, referring to the Torino Olympic
Organizing Committee.
“Torino 2006, in which UNEP has been a partner, set
targets and timetables across a wide range of environmental and sustainability
criteria… I sincerely hope that the next Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada,
in 2010, along with operators of winter sports globally, pick up the Torino
torch en route to the ultimate goal of realizing sustainable sporting events and
leisure activities across the world,” he added.
A cornerstone of the ‘green’ effort was
the Heritage Climate TORINO (HECTOR) project designed to make the Games
carbon neutral. The organizers calculated that the 16-day event would generate
the equivalent of just over 100,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide with the main
sources coming from transport and the operation of the venues.
Under HECTOR much of these emissions were offset by
‘credits’ in line with the international climate change treaty, such as
financing renewable energy and sustainable energy projects. Some 5 million Euros
were invested in domestic projects such as district heating projects, while
internationally “verifiable emissions reductions” were purchased from certified
green and cleaner energy projects in Eritrea, Mexico and Sri Lanka.
A tree planting project in Kenya, under UNEP’s Plant for
the Planet initiative, also contributed.
Close to 700,000 tonnes of the 103,500 tonnes produced,
or just over 67 per cent of the greenhouse gases are thus being offset and the
local Piedmont region is looking at funding additional projects to offset the
remaining third not covered under HECTOR.
Other eco-friendly schemes included water-saving
measures, soil and land use rehabilitation, and waste management.
UNEP has been conducting a sports-wide campaign for
major events and has already an agreement to make the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games
the greenest ever, from cutting air, water and noise pollution to transport,
landscaping and disposal of solid waste.
It reached a similar agreement with the International
Football Federation (FIFA) for last summer’s World Cup in Germany, the “green
Goal” project, and the score-card on that will be released tomorrow.
The two-day G-ForSE conference, organized by UNEP and
the Global Sports Alliance, brings together some of the leading experts from
around the world involved in sports and the environment.
These include architects, specialists in rainwater
harvesting, energy experts, environmentalists, members of various sports
organizations such as the Environment Director of the United States-base
National Football League (NFL), and Olympic Federations such as the
International Rowing Federation. During the meeting UNEP is scheduled to sign an
agreement with a new partner – the Federation Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM).
Source: UN News Service
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