Posts Tagged ‘sem’
On Thursday, May 6, Professor Sackett, the Chief Scientist for Australia, presented at the Sir Mark Oliphant CleanTech conference dinner, hosted at the MCG, on the topic of Green Sport.
In referring to some of the great moments in sport she said “with every one of these moments in our sporting history has come emissions of carbon, in the form of CO2 and soot, the same substances that are directly or indirectly risking tennis players fainting at the Australian open as they fight through our hottest summers yet, Olympic athletes to wheeze as they run through poor air quality in Beijing, and contributing to drought in areas where athletes need fields to train.”
Professor Sackett went on to say that “sport is, without a doubt, a crucial part of the Australian cultural fabric” and at Greensense we believe it is an industry that through it’s leadership has the ability to educate and influence a nation to more sustainable living. We are already engaged with the WA Football Commission, Triathlon WA, Perth 2011 and the Drug Aware Pro, some of WA’s leading sporting groups, to help them become leaders in sustainable events and operations. We are working with them on everything from sustainable event management, education and awareness, energy efficient buildings and organising green team initiatives.
The key things Professor Sackett suggested a sporting event must take into account are:
– the greenhouse costs of building the stadium or venue,
– the transportation of tens of thousands of spectators,
– stadium lighting
– and even the cost of old Bob sitting at home watching the game on his voracious plasma TV.
A key suggestion related to transportation as one of the largest contributors to carbon emissions, where encouraging and subsidising public transport would assist in reducing the number of cars on the road and CO2 in the air. Another key area is development in sustainable architecture. According to research conducted by CSIRO, energy use in buildings accounts for 26 per cent of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions.
We’re already working with some of Western Australian’s top sporting events to help make sport more sustainable, including the Perth 2011 Sailing Regatta, Drug Aware Pro, TriWA and the Bussleton Half-Ironman, and, the Western Australian Football Commission.
We’re passionate about Sustainable Sport. We’d love to help you make your sport or sporting event more sustainable. You can read more about our sustainable event management services or contact us for more information.
Most people in Perth are aware that Fremantle was selected to host the 2011 ISAF Sailing World Championships. This is exciting news for Perth, with it set to be the biggest sailing event to hit our shores since the 1987 America’s Cup Defence.
Just as exciting for Greensense, is that fact that we will be involved in helping to make this event as environmentally responsible as possible through a partnership announced this month (read the press release here). We will be assisting with the development and monitoring of their Environmental and Sustainability Programme and will report on various aspects of the event such as energy use, waste management and recycling and carbon emissions.
With over 18 months still to go before the event, it’s great to see that the event organisers have recognised the value of the environment to the community early in the planning process to enable robust plans to be put in place and meaningful relationships to be developed, ensuring the best possible outcomes between now and December 2011.
Here’s to sustainable sport and a sustainable world championships in Perth!
On March 22–24, the WA Sustainable Energy Association will be hosting the Energising WA conference and Greensense is proud to be involved on a number of levels. Not only are we a Silver Sponsor of the conference, but we are also contributing by conducting a sustainability audit aimed at measuring the impact of the event to ensure the sustainability of future events — a theme at the core of WASEA’s business.
We’ll also be exhibiting at the conference — at stand number 1 — so why not come and say hello? We’ll be showcasing our dashboard product, Greensense View, which aims to increase awareness of realtime energy use, drive behavioural change and reduce consumption.
But wait, there’s still more! Greensense is also excited to announce that our Local Government Greenhouse Gas Reporting and Abatement Platform is a finalist in the category of Community and Regional Initiative at the Awards for Excellence and Innovation. The winner will be announced on Wednesday March 24, so stay tuned to hear how we fair. This platform was developed in collaboration with the Western Australian Local Government Association (WALGA). You can read more about it here.
Earlier this month, Pete and I took a team to Southbound as part of Greensense’s ongoing partnership with Sunset Events as their sustainability auditor. For any who don’t know, Southbound is one of Western Australia’s largest and most iconic music festivals. Held in Busselton, three hours south from Perth, it attracts over 20, 000 people over the weekend.
Our role at an event like Southbound is to work with the team at Sunset Events, as well as the large number of suppliers to the festival, to understand exactly what goes into putting on an event of this type and size, and importantly, the associated impacts of these activities in terms of energy and water consumption, waste management and carbon emissions.
During the festival itself, we were out and about surveying festival goers to understand how they travelled to Southbound as well as checking out Southbound’s other green initiatives. This helps us understand how well (or not) these ideas actually work in reality and means we can make recommendations on how to reduce the impact of future events.
One of the most positive things for us was to see FestivalBudi in action for the first time in Australia: Acting on a recommendation from a previous Greensense sustainability audit, Southbound promoted the use of FestivalBudi (part of Liftshare) as a means of putting travellers in touch with each other to encourage carpooling to festival. While we were surveying, we came across a few people who had used it and everyone thought it was a great idea to save money, meet new people and do their bit for the environment.
To top it all off, when we weren’t surveying festival goers, counting cars in the carpark or chatting with the stall holders, we still managed to see some great bands and have a dance in the silent disco — what a great start to the year!