The green and white club’s environmental program is in its third year of life, a three-year period in which Real Betis has become the leading football team in environmental sustainability.
Real Betis celebrates the third year of Forever Green, the green and white club’s environmental sustainability platform. Three years working to combat climate change, an effort that has made Real Betis one of the leading football clubs in this field, recognized as the second most sustainable European football club and the first in LaLiga, according to Brand Finance.
Since the birth of Forever Green, over 117 actions have been developed. These include clean-ups of natural spaces, the installation of a fleet of scooters and electric bicycles for Club employees, as well as promoting their use by fans through discounts and recycling and awareness campaigns, among other actions. Real Betis also continues to work on the Club’s own facilities to minimize its impact on the environment.
Over these four years of study, monitoring, and measurement of carbon footprint, the Club has managed to reduce its emissions by nearly 31% compared to the 2018/2019 base season, resulting in almost 1,000 fewer tCO2e, which is the same emissions produced to treat and purify 2,597Hm3 of water.
Additionally, the Club has recently gone further and become a carbon-neutral team by offsetting in a renewable energy generation project through the construction and operation of a 90 MW wind farm called Piedra Larga Wind Farm located in Mexico.
Among the milestones achieved during this season, the construction of the new Ciudad Deportiva Rafael Gordillo and the upcoming renovation of the Estadio Benito Villamarín stand out. Both infrastructures will have facilities designed according to the most sustainable criteria and techniques from an environmental perspective. Among them, the water recycling system through an irrigation system stands out, as well as the use of cork instead of rubber, one of the largest emitters of microplastics.
Otro momento para la historia de Forever Green que tuvo lugar durante el último año fue la celebración del segundo partido por la sostenibilidad de LaLiga, que tuvo lugar en el Real Betis ? Espanyol last April and which also extended to the Club’s sports sections. The actions carried out around these matches prevented the emission of almost 11 tons of CO2e impact into the atmosphere compared to a normal match.
With all this data on the table, Forever Green has made Real Betis one of the most sustainable clubs on the planet and, therefore, has received several global awards, precisely receiving an award for the action of the goal nets made with fishing nets, a project carried out together with Finetwork. Additionally, also for the work done in environmental matters, the Club has received awards such as the ‘GBS- Winner Best ENVIRONMENTAL Performance” and has been recognized by the OBS Business School.
Additionally, such important institutions as LaLiga – the entity with which Forever Green was presented -, ACB, Liga F, Liga Nacional de Fútbol Sala, Supercopa Endesa, the final of the Copa del Rey, World Football Summit, the Spanish Padel Championship, the Mexican Basketball League’s first division team, Abejas de León, the Government of Spain, the Andalusian Government, The Climate Plegde, or Climate Neutral Now have also joined Real Betis’ environmental project.
Taking advantage of the classification in the UEFA, Real Betis has created environmental alliances with teams such as Roma, Ludogorets, Aris Limassol, Sparta Prague, or Zenit for the implementation of sustainable initiatives and awareness campaigns. Additionally, the green and white club is part of European projects working on combating climate change.
As a result of these three years of work, Forever Green has become known worldwide, reaching 670 million people and reaching 87 countries, according to data provided by Blinkfire and Kantar. Real Betis’ environmental program has had visibility in 230 media outlets.
One of Forever Green’s objectives is to be a mouthpiece for all those organizations and entities that have joined the fight against climate change with concrete actions to inspire society to join this mission. Thus, the sustainability platform already has more than 83 companies and organizations attached. Additionally, 20 companies have joined as partners in Forever Green’s action areas, such as Asisa, Arus, Asterius, Bioalverde, Bosquia, Bureau Veritas, Caixabank, Davis Cup, Ecoadvance, Ecoterrae, Ecogranja La Pradera, Ecolec, Endesa, Ecovidrio, Empaquetados y Recuperaciones, English Connection, Eternal Energy, Endesa, Fundación Cajasol, Finetwork, Fundación ECOLEC, Graphstone, Gravity Wave, Herbalife Nutrition, Medac, Moovit, La España Azul, Lime, Patatas Arrebola, Play Station (Sony), Reale, Social Energy, Scoobic Templo Cafés, ONCE, Volvo, World Football Summit, and Wuolah.
Forever Green wants to continue growing by adding entities and initiatives to expand the movement and increasingly multiply its impact on the fight against the climate emergency.
Three years of learning and work. An innovative sustainability platform that has positioned Real Betis Balompié as one of the most committed clubs in Europe and the world to the environment, showing
