The 2026 World Cup will be the largest in history, with 48 teams and their games divided into three countries: Canada, the United States and Mexico. In its obsession with growth, FIFA would be ignoring environmental impacts, warns researchers.
“There is a tendency to reduce carbon footprint at the Olympic Games, but with the FIFA World Cup occurs just the opposite,” David Gogogishvili, a geographer at the University of Lausanne (Switzerland) and specialist in major sporting events, told AFP.
The 2026 World Cup will be the opposite of the 2022 edition, which was held at Qatar and was also criticized for the accelerated construction of overdose and air conditioning stadiums in this small country of extremely hot climate.
From the stadium of Toronto to Arlington, Texas, the 16 headquarters already existed at the time of choosing the headquarters, a point particularly emphasized by those responsible for the candidacy “United 2026”.
But the distances between the headquarters are huge. From Vancouver to Mexico, passing by Boston, Miami and Los Angeles, among others, the teams, journalists and the “more than 5 million fans” expected by FIFA will have to make long trips, with distances sometimes over 4,000 km between headquarters.
The only official estimate of the carbon footprint –3.7 million tons of CO2, a record – is the one contained in the proposal and is already outdated, as the number of matches has increased from 80 to 104 since then.
FIFA, whose president, Gianni Infantino, defended its “determination” to combat global warming at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, promised in 2018 “measure, reduce and compensate” the world’s heart -related emissions.
Alleging logistical reasons, the organization decided in May 2023 to group the group stage into three “regional poles”, but the eliminatory phase – which represents a third of the total matches – will occupy the entire map of headquarters of the tournament.
More broadly, FIFA has retreated to any promises related to the 2026 edition since it was criticized in June 2023 by an entity in Switzerland, its headquarters, by boating the “climate neutrality” of the 2022 World Cup without providing evidence that supports this statement.
In addition to the technical debate on carbon calculations and compensations, there is a discovery that generates consensus: the best way to reduce the impact of large events is to “limit” its scope, as the IOC has its limit of 10,500 athletes for the Summer Olympic Games, David Gogishvili recalls.
But FIFA is taking measurements in the opposite direction and has expanded the number of selections participating in its World Cup from 32 to 48.
According to this researcher, the “appetite for growth” of the international federation leads to more matches, more athletes, more fans and more flights, entering “an endless cycle”.
Last February, the New Weather Institute and Scientists for Global Responsibility highlighted in a joint report the climate cost of each international match, which would be “26 to 42 times higher than an elite match” from any national championship.
“A match during a men’s World Cup is responsible for 44,000 to 72,000 tons of CO2, which is equivalent to emissions from 31,500 to 51,500 British cars all year long,” these researchers predicted.
Far from limiting itself to 2026, “it seems that FIFA’s environmental negationism will continue,” noted Gilles Paché, a professor at the University of Aix-Marselha (France) last year in the Journal of Management Research.
FIFA has decided that the 2030 World Cup will be held on three continents, with three matches in South America (Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay), before sharing the rest of the tournament between Morocco, Spain and Portugal for the remaining 101 matches.
Conmebol even proposed to increase the number of participants to 64 selections in 2030, in honor of the centenary of the tournament. Infantine has not yet commented on the subject.
Another event on the horizon will probably be accompanied by environmental controversy: the 2034 World Cup, which will be held in Saudi Arabia, with a climate similar to Qatar, but with 40 more matches than the 2022 tournament and the Saudi Giant Aramco, the world’s largest oil company, having become one of FIFA’s leading sponsors.
