The Sustainability Report Podcast

In this podcast episode, Eve Joseph, head of social impact and sustainability and a former Microsoft leader, shares insights on what sport can learn from the tech industry’s approach to sustainability.

The conversation delves into the transformative role of data, highlighting why democratising access to information is essential for understanding and mitigating the environmental risks faced by athletes, event hosts and the wider sports ecosystem.

Eve also discusses the mission and achievements of the Clean Water Sports Alliance, shedding light on its progress and future plans to address critical environmental challenges.

When we think about the climate risks and consequences facing sport, we often think about elite sporting competition?

But what about sport for good organisations and grassroots sport clubs? 

There’s not much of a focus on them even though, in most cases, they are even more vulnerable. However, Football For Future and Common Goal have teamed up to develop the Fields of Change Handbook, an environmental sustainability resource for sport for good organisations.

In this episode, we speak Elliot Arthur-Worsop, founder of Football For Future, Jérémy Houssin, environmental lead at Commo...

Sustainability, in some quarters of the sports industry, is viewed as a cost rather than investment.

But what if climate action could actually be an opportunity to diversity income streams for sports organisations?

That's a concept put forward by Jamie Farndale in this episode of the podcast, where he reflects on his research that suggests affinity with sport can support the take-up of low-carbon technologies and behaviours.

The former captain of the Scotland rugby sevens team and current GM of club development and sustainability for Hong Kong China Rugby tells the sports industry...

How can a “non-essential” sector like sport justify its existence on a planet with finite resources?

It was a question posed by Damian Foxall, sustainability manager of the 11th Hour Racing Team, during episode 96 of the podcast that we try to unpack.

Foxall reflects on a successful 2023, in which his team was crowned champions of The Ocean Race. At the end of the season, it also produced a sustainability report full of achievements and case studies.

In addition, Kristen Fulmer, head of sustainability at Oak View Group (operator of the Climate Pledge Arena in S...

As we head into another COP, two major things remain unclear for our industry: on a macro level, what climate trajectory will we find ourselves on once all is said and done in two weeks? And, at a sector level, what role is sport expected to play to keep this trajectory as low as possible?

COP28 is a key talking point in episode 95 of the podcast as we talk to SailGP’s Fiona Morgan about its Race for the Future takeover in Dubai. Russell Seymour of BASIS talks about the new Game Changer II report, which lays ba...

Collectively, more than three-quarters of the fans of Bohemian FC, Club Brugge KV, FC St Pauli, FC Twente, Ferencvárosi TC, Real Betis and SV Werder Bremen believe their clubs and football in general need to do more to support and accelerate the shift to a lower carbon society.

But how can football clubs position themselves as the drivers of this transition – and crucially, how can they ensure that transition is just and beneficial for their local communities.

That’s what we try to unpack in this episode of the podcast alongside Sean McCabe (Bohemian Footb...

A week after the Sport Positive Summit, Kate Chapman (London Marathon Events), Sara Kassam (UK Sport) and Rikke Rønholt Albertsen (Danish Olympic Committee) help us unpick some of the key talking points.

Can growth and sustainability coexist in sport? How can sport wean itself off of fossil fuel sponsorship? What does the sports industry collectively need to say when we reconvene again in 12 months time? We cover it all.

Protecting humans, animals and plants. That’s what climate justice boils down to, says Jessica Murfree. 

In this edition of the podcast, Murfree (sport ecologist and assistant professor at the University of Cincinati) and Claire Poole look ahead to the Sport Positive Summit, exploring how the industry can position itself best to promote climate action and justice through thoughtful discourse.

The episode focuses on the importance of diverse perspectives, risk management and using nuance language when it comes to sustainability claims.

And Poole, founder and chief executive of Sport Positive, lifts the lid on...

In this podcast episode, we delve into the nuanced approach sports should take towards carbon emissions and question whether current best practices in carbon measurement and reduction are fit-for-purpose for an industry with such distinctive challenges.

In the company of Nicola Barr, the decarbonising sport lead at FrontRunners, and a current player for the Greater Western Sydney Giants, and Alice Ashpitel, head of sustainability at Mercedes F1, we explore the practicalities of investing in sustainable fuels, the shift from high-polluting sponsors and the influential role of athletes in this endeavour.

Dr. Maddy Orr, Bob Ramsak and Dr. Sheila Nguyen were the three guests as The Sustainability Report Podcast came back after a six month rest.

While Ramsak (head of sustainability for World Athletics) and Nguyen (head of sustainability for the FIFA Women’s World Cup Australia  New Zealand 2023) spoke about managing the environmental impact of two of the year’s biggest sporting events, Orr discussed the disruption sport had experienced as a result to extreme weather in recent months.

All three guests also explored the evolving role of the sustainability professional in sport and the chang...

Sport in Africa has huge cultural significance – and every single nation in the vast continent is impacted by significant environmental and social challenges.

Sustainable Sport Africa, established by Rachel Aron and Tristan Niesslein, aims to position sport as a medium to address some of these challenges, which, in turn, should make African sports properties more appealing to potential investors.

In this episode of the podcast, Aron and Niesslein discuss the launch of the organisation and some of its key objectives.

Football fans are often treated as a problem. But, actually, when it comes to throwing their weight behind large societal issues – such as anti-racism and refugee support – they can be a significant part of the solution.

That’s according to Jenny Amann and Mark Doidge, doctoral researcher and senior research fellow respectively at the University of Brighton. Their latest piece of research, titled ‘Mobilising Football Fans on Climate Change’, explores how this diverse group of people, brought together by the love of the game or a team, can hold the key when it comes to positive behaviour change rel...

Calling the Wolverhampton Wanderers sustainability strategy ‘One Pack, One Planet’ was always going to be a winner with fans.

But beyond the clever branding – and the launch of the strategy during a really successful Green Football Weekend – One Pack, One Planet was built on solid foundations of robust impact assessments, clear communications with club staff and giving departments the agency to develop their own action plans to achieve targets in four main areas: carbon, waste, nature and culture.

In this episode of the podcast, Thom Rawson, the project lead, explains the work that went on behind t...

A focus on purpose and sustainability is shifting sports partnerships from traditional transactional deals to deeper, strategic, holistic relationships.

That’s according to Mya Doelling, the global partnerships manager for the International Olympic Committee (IOC). And in this episode of the podcast, she explains how purposeful partnerships are gaining traction in sport, using the IOC’s Climate Action Awards partnership with Airbnb, Deloitte and P&G as cases in point.

Together with her colleague Julie Duffus, the IOC’s senior sustainability manager, Doelling reveals how more than two years of preparation – which included the mapping of the I...

When Lorenzo Sacchetti was asked to embark on a project to increase biodiversity at a motorsports track by his Copenhagen Business School tutor Rikke Albertsen and project manager at the Dansk Automobil Sports Union (DASU), Michella Skov, he was a little surprised.

How does nature conservation and motorsport – an unsustainable activity in Lorenzo’s mind – fit together?

Alongside Albertsen, Skov and his friend and biodiversity expert Matilde Montagna, Sacchetti tried to find out by developing a biodiversity pilot project as one of DASU’s tracks – a pilot project that could form the foundation for a wider biod...

“Part of the feast – not a spectator in it.” 

Using the words of the renowned Australian environmental philosopher and writer, Val Plumwood, Rebecca Olive reflects on the vulnerability she felt when swimming in the ocean, a few hundred metres away from the shore, with no one close enough to save her if something unexpected occurred.

During episode 84 of The Sustainability Report Podcast, the senior research fellow at RMIT University talks about her research, which investigates the relationship between sportspeople like swimmers and surfers with nature, and whether these feelings of connection and vul...

Forest fires, melting ice caps, extreme storms. It’s easy to perceive climate change as an ‘environmental problem’, external from the everyday lives of humans, particularly for those of us who live in parts of the world where climate impacts aren’t quite so stark yet.

But climate change is a human problem, with people’s health, jobs, security and recreation impacted.

Some people are affected more than others. In general terms, people who are poorer economically, who come from certain ethnic backgrounds and live in certain neighbourhoods or nations feel the negative consequence more keenly tha...

Support and practical help, or lack of, is often the number one reason for inaction when it comes to sustainability. The will is there, but the fear persists that it won’t be done right, leading to a number of negative consequences.

In episode #81 of the podcast, we explore the ASAP (As Sustainable As Possible) project, in which three National Olympic Committees (NOCs) with relatively mature approaches to sustainability (Finnish, Danish, German) support three mentee NOCs who want to reach a similar level (Czech, Slovak, Hungarian), with comprehensive sustainability strategies.

Jana Janotova (Czech Olympic Committee) an...

Becoming a sustainability leader has been earmarked as a way to differentiate and attract new fans and partners for emerging sports.

In this episode of the podcast, we discover how the sport of floorball is making environmental responsibility a key part of its growth strategy, principally through one of its key events: the Men’s World Floorball Championships in Zürich later this year.

Daniel Kasser (Zürich 2022 organising committee), Kai Rassmus Landwehr (MyClimate) and Tero Kalsta (International Floorball Federation) talk us through the preparations to make the event climate neutral.

Episode #80 talk...