The Planet Kicks Back
Germany hopes to win the World Cup in July
(or at least make it carbon-neutral)
For German soccer fans,
March 1, 2006, is a date that will live in infamy. After a 4–1 defeat by Italy, now known as the Fiasco of Florence, even the most rabid supporters had to concede that Germany's chances of winning this summer's World Cup were slim. But the German Soccer Federation and the Federal Ministry of the Environment have come up with a comforting new slogan: If Germany can't be soccer's Weltmeister -- world champion -- it can at least be Umweltmeister -- Champion of the Environment.
Having committed itself to phasing out its nuclear power plants by 2021 and having built one of the world's fastest-growing markets for wind power, Germany has now set its sights on hosting what soccer legend Franz Beckenbauer, captain of the 1974 world champion team, calls "the first carbon-neutral World Cup." The official name for the idea is Green Goal.
The plan, adopted by the World Cup Organizing Committee in 2001, has three components: reducing by 20 percent the volume of waste generated and the amount of energy and water consumed during the tournament's 64 games; leaving behind a "green legacy" for the 12 German stadiums that will stage the event; and neutralizing the 100,000 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions produced by an anticipated 3.2 million spectators. Stadium garbage will be strictly separated for recycling, rainwater will be used for toilets and turf-sprinkling systems, and all new lighting will be energy efficient. Plans call for 50 percent of visitors to use public transportation. Soft drinks will be cooled by energy-efficient refrigerators, and the bratwurst -- Germany's ubiquitous fast food -- will be served on rolls, without the paper plates.
As for the green legacy, as a result of 1.4 billion euros' worth of new investments, several of the participating stadiums now have solar panels, rainwater tanks, permeable parking lots that allow rainwater to drain into the soil, seats made of recycled materials, and improved connections to public transportation systems. But the most ambitious goal of all, according to Hartmut Stahl, who developed the Green Goal plan for Germany's Oeko-Institut, a leading environmental research center, is to offset the tournament's additional production of greenhouse gases inside Germany (though not those resulting from international travel). To accomplish this, the German Soccer Association, FIFA (the sport's international governing body), and sponsors such as Deutsche Telekom will fund renewable-energy projects in tsunami-affected parts of Tamil Nadu in southern India and in South Africa -- which, appropriately enough, will host the World Cup in 2010. For more information, see www.greengoal.de.
-- Bernhard Poetter
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200 state food-safety and public-health protections were removed in April by the National Uniformity for Food Act. Since 2000 the American food industry has contributed more than $81 million to congressional campaigns.
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