The Olympics have historically been an incredibly wasteful endeavor for whichever city has hosted them. This summer's Paris Games sought to change that with several new environmentally friendly practices, Forbes reported.
The changes listed — medals made of iron taken from the Eiffel Tower, shuttlecocks recycled into coffee tables, and electric boats used during the opening ceremony — are token gestures that seem intended to nod toward the idea of sustainability more than anything else.
But the Olympics did also take several steps forward in terms of real sustainability. Instead of building new arenas and competition centers from scratch, Paris organizers repurposed existing buildings that can revert to their original uses now that the Games are over. (Only one new building, the Aquatics Centre, was constructed.)
Officials also prioritized setting up competitions at outdoor locations instead of inside arenas, limiting the amount of indoor structures that were needed. The opening ceremony also took place outside, on the River Seine.
After previous Olympics, newly constructed venues have fallen into disuse.
The Paris Olympics also cut the amount of planet-overheating air pollution produced, as its official telecommunications provider, Orange, set a goal of only 11,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions, which it aimed to achieve by sourcing equipment locally and shipping things by sea instead of air.
These improvements could serve as a blueprint for future Olympic Games — or for any city hosting a large-scale event. While the Olympics have a reputation for harming the cities that host them — particularly the people without housing who live in the city centers and are often displaced prior to the Games, as they were again this year — that does not mean those practices, including the environmentally unfriendly ones, need to continue into the future.
Join our free newsletter for good news and useful tips, and don't miss this cool list of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet.
Cool Picks
