Green Energy Sports Stadiums Around The World

Sports is a huge industry with multitudes of fans, gigantic profits, and even bigger energy bills. Sports stadiums use a ton of energy--something that people normally don't think about when they go cheer on their teams at games that are becoming increasing more expensive to attend. Considering how much money the sports industry brings in and how much it consumes, very few sports organizations have made the effort to go green.

Upon recently hearing that the Arizona Cardinals home stadium would be powered with 100 percent renewable energy this football season I did a little research and found some of the top green stadiums in the world on CalFinder.

1. Fenway Park
Home of the Boston Red Sox baseball team, this historic stadium has been around since 1912 and has gone through a considerable amount of changes since then. In 2008, the stadium installed solar panels which heat up 37 percent of the stadium's water. The stadium also has a huge recycling initiative which includes the "Dream Team"--a vivacious group of college-age volunteers who retrieve recyclable materials during games.

2. AT&T Park
The San Francisco Giants home stadium has a 600 panel solar array. The 120 kW system generates a level of electricity that could power 40 homes. The systems main purpose is to power the stadium's scoreboard.

3. Easy Credit Stadion
Football--commonly known as soccer in the states--is seriously popular in Europe. The FC Nurenberg football club, located in Germany, is one of the best green stadiums in Europe. In 2006, the stadium installed a large solar system which provides 140 kW of electricity per year.

4. Stade de Suisse
Now we're getting to the big guns--this is one of the greenest sports stadiums in the world. It is located in Bern, Switzerland. Since about 2005 the stadium has had 7,000 solar panels on its roof. This particular solar array produces a whooping 1,200,000 kWh annually. This is enough energy to power 400 average Switzerland homes.

5. Dragon Stadium
Dragon Stadium is located in Taiwan is well known for being the world's greenest stadium. It is not only the greenest stadium, it is also the first 100 percent solar powered stadium in the world. It was opened in 2009 and has 8,844 solar panels. The panels generate enough electricity to power the stadium's two gigantic scoreboards and 3,300 lights. The panels actually produce excess green energy which is sold by the government.

Recently, the University of Phoenix announced that it had teamed up with SRP to provide 100 percent renewable energy to the Arizona Cardinals home stadium. The university is providing 1,135,000 kilowatt-hours of green energy to power all 10 of the Cardinals scheduled home games. Phoenix solar experts state that this is a whooping amount of energy that will make a substantial impact on the local environment. Arizona solar officials say that the amount of energy being provided is equivalent to the amount of energy that 60 homes would use over the course of a year.

This recent news inspired me to find out about other green stadiums--of which there are very few around the world. Phoenix solar authorities believe that it could be a very slowly growing trend and hope that more stadiums follow suit. Parking lot lights, stadium lights, concession stands, scoreboards, and more need to be powered, say Phoenix solar experts. This adds up to a whole lot of energy especially considering that sports stadiums are huge, often seating up to 100,000 people.

All in all, Phoenix solar experts believe that when sports organizations begin to act more conscientiously we will see in increase in green stadiums.