‘Green card for the planet’? Fifa’s World Cup is on pace to be a climate catastrophe | World Cup 2026
SFootball fans are increasingly watching preparations for the 2026 World Cup through their fingers. The most popular sporting event on the planet is awash in controversy, whether it’s the exorbitant ticket prices, the question of Iran’s participation as the president of one of the host countries threatens to commit war crimes against the event, or the role that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement may or may not play in policing the event. And yet, amid the political pyrotechnics, lies a fiasco that carries as many long-term perils as any: the tournament’s staggering contribution to runaway climate change.
Not only is the 2026 World Cup the most politically inflammatory tournament in modern history, it is also on track to become the “most polluting” World Cup of all time, with total greenhouse gas emissions reaching nearly twice the historical average. Scientists estimate the tournament will generate around 9 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent. Air travel accounts for about 7.7 million tons of that carbon budget, more than four times that of the average tournaments held between 2010 and 2022. The researchers note that the most pessimistic upper estimate for air travel is about 13.7 million tons of CO2. This might sound bad, but that’s just because World Cup broadcasts have never been this bad.
Much of this can be attributed to Fifa’s goals. He chose to increase the number of participating teams to 48, compared to 32 at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. It also selected three host countries – Canada, Mexico and the United States – which cover a wide geographic scope. Even if America’s rail system wasn’t in a state of relative ruin, the distances many fans must travel make less carbon-intensive means of transportation impractical.
Some might point out that the 9 million tonnes of CO2 estimated for the 2026 World Cup pales in comparison to the 5.9 million tonnes of CO2. billion tons of CO2 that the United States released into the air in 2025 alone. While this is true, it is also true that to passively enable FIFA to willfully wreck the environment is to succumb to greenwashing: the deceptive practice of talking about a great green game, but failing to follow through with meaningful sustainability measures. FIFA is heading in the wrong direction as its activists rack up numerous climate litigation victories against unrepentant greenwashers.
Let’s be clear: FIFA has long been a shameless purveyor of greenwashing. Exhibit A: The 2022 World Cup in Qatar. Before the tournament, Fifa president Gianni Infantino implored soccer fans to “raise the Fifa Green Card for the Planet,” meaning “record a short message” explaining “what you will do to preserve the environment and save our world” and post it online. This innocuous nonsense was part of Infantino’s “goal” to make the 2022 World Cup “carbon neutral.”
In reality, the Qatar 2022 World Cup was a carbon bomb in sporting form. It required more than 1,000 daily inbound and outbound flights, used an energy-intensive desalination system to purify water, and relied on largely bogus carbon offset systems. Even grass seed for well-maintained soccer fields was transported from North America on air-conditioned planes.
Somehow the 2026 World Cup is even worse. As rising greenhouse gas emissions cause premature deaths, researcher Tim Walters says this World Cup is the deadliest sporting event in history, a sign of FIFA’s “abject misanthropy.”
Breathtaking absurdities abound. During the 2022 World Cup, stadiums were located relatively close to each other, connected by metro and buses. During the 2026 World Cup, the Bosnia and Herzegovina team – along with their supporters and their families – will have to travel more than 5,000 km (3,144 mi) from Toronto to Los Angeles via Seattle. Their training camp is in Salt Lake City, which means they’ll be logging extra carbon miles. Algeria will accumulate approximately 4,800 km (2,972 mi) between Kansas City and San Francisco and return. The Czech Republic starts in Guadalajara before heading to Atlanta and then Mexico City, covering more than 4,500 km (2,811 mi).
Hairspray on top of a World Cup sponsorship that looks like it was concocted in a greenwashing lab. In 2024, Fifa signed a four-year partnership agreement with Aramco, the Saudi energy giant which is the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitting company, responsible for more than 4% of all emissions since 1965. More than 100 professional female footballers, including some of the biggest names in football, signed a letter condemning the partnership, citing environmental impacts as a serious problem. As Canadian national team captain Jessie Fleming said: “Aramco is one of the biggest polluters on the planet we all live on. By accepting Aramco’s sponsorship, FIFA is choosing money over the safety of women and the safety of the planet.”
At this summer’s World Cup, player safety is also at risk due to extreme heat caused by rampant climate change. The National Weather Service warns that every region of the United States will experience temperatures above historical averages for the two months in which the tournament will take place. A Guardian analysis found that “high levels of heat and humidity will impact the ability of teams to perform on the field”, with wet bulb temperature (WBGT) – a measurement that includes not only air temperature but also direct sunlight, humidity and wind speed – likely to cause problems. The analysis suggests that “26 World Cup matches will be played when the temperature is at or above 26°C (78.8°F) WBGT” – a threshold beyond which Fifpro, the global players’ union, says cooling breaks are necessary.
This follows an academic study which arrived at the even more dire finding that 14 of the 16 host cities are likely to experience average WBGT temperatures above 28°C (82.4°F) in June and July. Fifpro argued that a 28C WBGT deserves a possible suspension from the match. All of this, the researchers say, raises “the potentially serious concern of extreme heat for the health of players and match officials during the 2026 FIFA World Cup.” Even though three of the cities most exposed to potentially dangerous heat levels – Houston, Dallas and Atlanta – have air-conditioned stadiums, the energy needed for cooling doesn’t really contribute to climate change.
One of the authors of that study, Dr Madeleine Orr of the University of Toronto, told the Guardian: “Perhaps what is most absurd to me is the lack of sensible preparation on the part of event organizers to keep people safe in extreme weather conditions. Hot, humid weather is to be expected during North American summers. The same goes for smoke from wildfires in the West and hurricane-force winds causing big storms in the East.” She added: “The only interest is to protect the athletes on the field, without any consideration for the fans, staff, media and volunteers working in the stands or on the streets. »
Fifa has taken measures to ease the heat. Many matches in the hottest cities will start in the evening, away from the hottest parts of the day. Fifa also announced last December that each half of each match would include a three-minute “hydration break”, regardless of weather conditions. To no one’s surprise, Fifa also ruled that TV channels could fill two minutes and 10 seconds of each break with commercials, provided they did not cut the ball within 20 seconds of the referee’s whistle and did not return 30 seconds before play resumed.
FIFA has raised the issue of climate change in its promotional material but only claims to respond to it. A “green card for the planet”? More like a big middle finger.
