All instructed, the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics are estimated to trigger the lack of 5.5 sq. kilometers of snowpack and 34 million metric tons of glacial ice. With out the emissions brought on by the occasion’s three primary sponsors, these numbers could be a lot decrease: 2.3 sq. kilometers of snowpack and about 14 million metric tons of glacial ice.
That’s in line with a January report from the New Climate Institute, which labored with Scientists for World Accountability and Champions for Earth to find out the environmental impacts of the 2026 Winter Olympics and whether or not or not the staging of the Video games was detrimental to the winter sports activities most impacted by local weather change. What they discovered was that whereas the Video games themselves brought about appreciable carbon emissions, the emissions brought on by three of of the occasion’s primary sponsors—Italian power firm Eni, automaker Stellantis, and ITA Airways—may probably give the occasion a a lot bigger carbon footprint.
Selling these firms on the Video games, the report’s authors argue, is estimated to bump up emissions “on account of elevated gross sales of excessive carbon items and providers” that these sponsors supply.
The report claims that Eni is liable for greater than half of whole emissions led to by the highest three sponsors, adopted by Stellantis and ITA. Whereas acknowledging the difficulties concerned in getting strong estimates on the businesses’ carbon emissions and the dimensions of the Olympic sponsorship offers, the report claims that the extra enterprise these firms stood to achieve from their involvement within the Video games may trigger 1.3 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equal emissions. That’s 40 p.c greater than the Olympics’ direct footprint, which is estimated to be about 930,000 metric tons.
This implies a further lack of 3.2 sq. kilometers of snowpack and greater than 20 million metric tons of glacial ice, including to the two.3 sq. kilometers of snow and 14 million metric tons of ice already impacted by the Video games themselves. Put one other method, this report claims that the Winter Olympics are contributing to a decline within the viability of the very sports activities they have a good time.
In response to the findings, an Eni consultant instructed WIRED that the report supplied a biased estimate of the corporate’s contribution to the emissions produced by the Video games. The corporate additionally famous “greater than 90 p.c of the fuels equipped by Eni to energy the Video games are derived from renewable uncooked supplies,” including that its help of the Video games is basically targeted on the provision of power services and doesn’t generate further climate-altering actions.
ITA responded to a request for remark by noting that “sustainability is a cornerstone of ITA Airways’ improvement technique” and pointed to its newer extra fuel-efficient fleet and plans to make use of sustainable aviation fuels. The Milano Cortina 2026 Basis, contacted straight concerning the Video games’ environmental influence, declined to remark. Stellantis didn’t reply to requests for clarification on its sustainability initiatives associated to the Olympics.
Winter sports activities are turning into more and more uncommon on account of their vulnerability to the consequences of worldwide warming. The numbers testify to an emergency already underway. Up to now 5 years, Italy, the Video games’ host nation, has misplaced 265 ski resorts. France, which is able to host the 2030 Winter Olympics, has seen greater than 180 resorts within the Alps shutter. Fifty-plus ski lifts and cable vehicles have closed in Switzerland. With every iteration, the Video games turn into more and more depending on artificially made snow.
Out of the 93 areas with the infrastructure essential to host the Winter Olympics, solely 52 of them will probably be “climate-reliable” by the 2050s if world emissions proceed at roughly their present charges, in line with a 2024 study commissioned by the Worldwide Olympic Committee. By the 2080s, that quantity drops to 46.
