Olympic Games versus Environmental Degradation

The Olympic Games concluded on 21/08/2016 registered millions of viewers and followers. There were however, mixed feelings or reactions from spectators world over regarding the participants? performances, our only hope is that many excel come the next Olympic Games.

There was so much to watch out for in the green city of Rio de Janeiro, also putting in consideration the increasing challenges we have with our environment today. Below are some of the Olympic events and how they unfolded, could they have played any role in the protection of our environment?

 1992- International Olympics Committee (I.O.C) attends the Earth Summit in Rio. The conference sparks ideas about how sports can play a positive role in promoting sustainability, foundation for the incorporation of environmental responsibility into the Olympics formed.

1994-Potential host cities required to demonstrate their commitment to a "Green Games". This means that candidate cities wanting to host a summer or winter Olympics games are to be chosen basing on their environmental plans contained in their proposals

1996-The International Olympics Committee adds "environment as a third dimension of Olympics, joining culture and Sports

2000-The 27th Olympic Games in Sydney become the first to make every aspect of the games environmentally minded. An Olympic basketball venue with a roof-based solar energy system and 665 houses in the Athlete?s village with combined solar panels were constructed. This ended the myth that green technology is too expensive to use on a large scale. Many trees were planted and trains were used to give free transport to spectators. An independent audit was done by Greenpeace through the games and a fairly positive report was given by the judges.

2002- Winter Olympics in Utah-Russia, the energy recycled from the curling hall?s air conditioning unit generated heat for the showers and the bathrooms at the venue (the system used ammonia which doesn?t destroy the ozone layer)

2012- Summer Olympics London, these observed an increase in the use of renewable energy and water recycling and over 31 of the 39 sustainability-related objectives were achieved, 62% of waste was actually re-used, recycled or composted, 100% of waste diverted from landfill, 86% of the Olympic park visitors travelled by rail while there was also an increased number of cyclists on central land.

2016-Summer Olympic Games held in Rio and some measures such as composting of organic waste, use of public transport for 100% of workers and spectators? journeys, carbon offsets for the 28500 athletes and staff expected to arrive by plane, partnership with 20 NGOS for sustainable food, 0% meals sourced from deforested areas and prize medals made from recyclable materials.

Despite the challenges faced, Rio de Janeiro has had a fair score being that they were able to  make gold medals under good working conditions without addition of mercury, used transportation systems that run on biodiesel fuel and had tried to get rid of a great percentage of carbon emissions associated with the games.

This is going to be a challenge to the more advanced and industrialized South Korea and Japan come the next winter and summer games respectively.

References

www.1millionwomen.com.au/blog/what-are-environmental-impacts-olympic-games/

www.unep.org>Tunza_10.1_Eng-Ir.pdf

www.humanosphere.org/environment/2016/08/mixed-results-on-sustainability-goals-for-the-rio-games/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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