Shooting for the stars: The NBA’s ambitious climate targets
The NBA is taking climate action
In 2019, the National Basketball Association (NBA) became one of the first professional sports leagues in the United States to sign the UN Sports for Climate Action Framework.
The NBA recognised the role it could play in addressing the climate crisis and has committed to reducing its emissions by 50% by 2030.
As one of the most watched professional sports leagues, the NBA is in a position to inspire fans, teams and partners to reduce their environmental impact.
On its journey to reaching its climate targets, the league is focusing on reducing team travel, engaging its fans and reducing emissions within basketball arenas.
A new calendar to reduce travel emissions
There are 30 teams in the NBA that will each play 41 away games every season. In one of the largest countries in the world, this creates a lot of air travel as teams fly coast to coast.
During the 2022-2023 regular season, teams flew an average of 41,000 miles each, but the NBA has managed to reduce the total by 50,000 miles with changes to game schedules.
Some cities, such as New York or Los Angeles, have two teams each, meaning a visiting team can play two games in one visit.
For example, when the Brooklyn Nets flew to California to play the Los Angeles Lakers on November 12th 2022, they were also scheduled to play the Los Angeles Clippers on the 14th.
The calendar has also been set so teams can play consecutive road games against the same opponent to reduce unnecessary back-and-forth across the country.
When the Chicago Bulls went to New York to play the Knicks in December 2022, consecutive games were scheduled on the 15th and 17th of December.
For the 2022-2023 season, the NBA’s schedule allowed 88 games to be played without travel for the teams, a 66% increase from the previous season.
55 of them were consecutive road games, and 33 were games in which teams played two games in a row in Los Angeles against the Clippers and Lakers or New York against the Knicks and Nets.
Reducing emissions in the NBA arenas
Beyond addressing travel emissions, the NBA is tackling the environmental impact of its arenas. In April 2023, the league launched its Arena Sustainability Task Force.
The objective is for all arenas to share best practices for increasing recycling, reducing waste, and saving energy within facilities. Here’s what some of the franchises have been doing:
Wells Fargo Center: The Philadelphia 76er’s arena has entered a long-term power purchase agreement with Constellation NewEnergy to match 100% of the facility’s electricity consumption with 100% renewable energy.
Intuit Dome: This arena is the future home of the LA Clippers. It’s being built with 300 electric vehicle charging points and will be equipped with solar panels to feed a battery energy storage system that could allow the arena to sustain itself off the Los Angeles grid for an entire game.
State Farm Arena: The Atlanta Hawks’ venue diverts more than 90% of its waste from landfills through a combination of reduction, reuse, recycling, and composting. In 2023, their efforts diverted over 3 million pounds of waste from landfills.
TD Garden: The Boston Celtics have partnered with Eversource to reduce the energy consumption of its arena through LED lighting and HVAC controls. This allows them to save nearly 10 million kWh of electricity per year.
Golden 1 Center: The Sacramento Kings’ home is 100% solar-powered, thanks to solar panels installed on the rooftop and renewable energy sourced from a solar farm. Additionally, 90% of the ingredients sourced for meals are from a 150-mile radius.
Making sustainability in sports a slam dunk
With the NBA Green program, the league is developing sustainability initiatives to reduce the basketball season’s environmental impact.
The NBA also uses its platform and reach to create waves of climate action. For Earth Day 2023, it partnered with Carbon Clever to educate fans about climate change.
The NBA is watched by all the other American leagues. So if it sets an example today and decides to take action on this, it will be a source of inspiration, because it has this capacity to be at the cutting edge."
Benjamin Adler, President of Game Earth
Through the power of basketball, the NBA can inspire teams, fans and other sports leagues to take climate action and collaborate on the journey to Net Zero.
