The National Football League is the largest American football league in the world where the best players from around the world compete to be the champions of the grittiest sport. Being such a large organization, the NFL has the highest average carbon footprint per game by offsetting upwards of 20,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide annually. The largest contributor to this number is the team and fan travel. In the 2023 Super Bowl (Super Bowl 57) the amount of carbon dioxide produced from just the fan travel was well over 3,000 metric tons.
The most sustainable team that gives back to the environment would be this Super Bowl winner, the Philadelphia Eagles. The stadium that they play in, Lincoln Financial Field, boasts the largest solar panel array in the league as well as having several micro wind turbines. These sources make up most of the stadium’s energy sources and the rest of the energy is purchased from offsite sources. Along with the Eagle’s our home team has also put in noticeable environmental efforts. The New England Patriots had many initiatives including installing solar power like the Eagles, creating EV charging stations, and implementing hand dryers. Since 2017, Gillette Stadium has implemented response initiatives that adjust the stadium’s energy consumption when energy is needed most in the world. The Patriot’s efforts have earned the stadium over 125,000 dollars and contributed to a more sustainable team and world.
The NFL established its environmental program, NFL Green, in 1993 with the mission to mitigate the environmental impact of the NFL’s major events like the Super Bowl. Projects that this organization is doing to make a more sustainable world include food recovery, community greening, material recovery, and so much more. A notable project NFL Green hosts before every Super Bowl is the Super Bowl E-Waste Event. This event is hosted at a local zoo for one day and works with Verizon, an NFL sponsor, to recapture valuable minerals found in electronics like computers, televisions, and speakers that otherwise would have been lost and wasted. Doing this helps preserve the animal habitats where these valuable minerals are mined. Although there are still a lot of carbon emissions released to the environment from the Super Bowl, it is still recognized as the world’s greenest sporting event thanks to the league’s contributions through this program.
