There's a record that the World Cup in North America has already broken: it will be the most polluting World Cup in history. According to an assessment prepared by Greenly, a company specializing in climate technologies, total emissions are expected to reach around 7.8 million tons of CO₂, or about 2.1 times more than the official figure recorded at the Qatar World Cup in 2022.
However, the most important issue relates to the structure of these emissions.
During the last World Cup, Qatar built seven new stadiums from scratch, generating significant emissions associated with infrastructure construction. While the tournament that has just started will use existing stadiums, the impact of infrastructure on total emissions will only amount to 3% of the total.
On the other hand, fan trips constitute about 87% of the total carbon footprint, since to follow the matches, fans have to move between three different countries in North America and cover much greater distances compared to those of the Qatar World Cup.
For this reason, despite the use of existing stadiums, the World Cup held in North America is expected to remain the event with the greatest environmental impact in the history of World Cups.
