The Sustainability Report: Climate Tickets and Fridays for Future: German football clubs take climate action

[…] Increased heat, storm surges and droughts also occupy the thoughts of those planning for the city’s future. That’s why, when the climate protests occurred in the early days of autumn, the leadership of the local Bundesliga football club, Werder Bremen, encouraged all employees to leave their desks (or the training pitches) to take part.

“Climate protection is essential. If we do not curb climate change there will be catastrophic consequences,” Anne-Kathrin Laufmann, the club’s director of corporate social responsibility, tells The Sustainability Report. “It is our responsibility to tackle it and to improve the situation.”

The 2004 Bundesliga champion has been one of the guiding lights in football’s small but growing movement to tackle climate change. Werder’s stadium, the 42,000-capacity Weser Stadion, boasts one of the largest solar panel integrations in Europe (200,000 solar cells that generates 800,000 KWH of electricity every year – enough to power 300 households), and will use 2020 to design a new environmental strategy.

Werder Bremen is one of a handful of sports entities to join the Sports for Future movement, which was created to amplify the voices of athletes, clubs, leagues and supporters on the climate crisis. Devised by sustainability strategist Stefan Wagner, Sports for Future has set the objective of launching campaigns, promoting projects and strengthening the ambition for climate protection among high-profile sports brands.

Fellow German Bundesliga football club TSG Hoffenheim, second division football club VfL Osnabrück, Global United FC and a number of athletes, including Anni Friesinger (speed skating), Holger Nikelis (wheelchair table tennis), Sebastian Polter (football), Jacqueline Otchere (pole vault) and Lutz Pfannenstiel (football) are among its founding members. […]