An investigation into the Millennium stadiums carbon footprint

Abstract

The Millennium Stadium is Wales's highest grossing tourism venue and generates a reported £105million pounds to the welsh economy every year from a study commissioned by the WRU regarding the Stadiums first seven years of operation. The figures which were published back in June 2009 also highlight that the Stadium's economic impact has reached the billion pound mark due to an array of impressive concerts and increasing attendances to the continued success of the RBS Six Nations and the Autumn International series. This makes the Millennium Stadium by far Wales premier tourist attraction with over a million visitors to the Stadium every year, and almost half of them from outside Wales. This report sets out to measure the carbon footprint of an event from the Millennium Stadiums impressive plethora of events and then aims to reduce the events environmental impact and carbon footprint to achieve the long term goal of corporate and environmental responsibility through a series of strategies suggested by the author and from the Julies Bicycle organization which specialises in awareness towards reducing carbon footprint and fulfilling company roles involving environmental, corporate and event responsibility. The strategies suggested will be in relation to four specific areas, energy usage, waste and water, and travel to the event. The Millennium Stadiums day-to-day/ annual operations will also be taken into consideration and measured using the current industry recognised standard Julies Bicycle online industry green tool. The event's environmental impact will be determined by calculating the carbon footprint through using the Julies Bicycle IG tools. The carbon footprint calculation is based on raw data from contractor bills provided by the Stadium which will include energy, water and waste consumption. The IG Tool also estimates audience numbers and modes of travel percentages from the information attained by the Millennium Stadium's surveys and annual reports. The report will also include a critique of the calculator tool with a breakdown from Julies Bicycle which clarifies aspects of the IG tools measurements. Finally the report will briefly look at what innovations are available to Events venues and Stadiums in particular and look at ways to involve these practices into a formulated strategy package looking to reduce carbon footprint overall at events.