Mon 23 Jan 2023 | by Rob Hutchins

Liverpool FC calls on fans to score climate goals for Green Football Weekend

Liverpool FC is calling on its supporters to take up the fight against climate change and get involved in Green Football Weekend. The campaign – which aligns with the club’s sustainability initiative, The Red Way – culminates on the weekend of February 3^rd to 5^th with many teams across the men’s and women’s games expected to wear sustainably-made green armbands to highlight the difference we can all make in protecting the environment. Liverpool FC is encouraging its fans to join the Green Football Cup, a system through which they can ‘score goals’ by taking climate-friendly actions such as having two meat-free days per week, turning down the thermostat by one degree, or cutting showers to four minutes. Supporters will be in for a chance to win prizes by signing up to www.greenfootballweekend.com and registering their ‘goals’. An area of rainforest equivalent to 1,000 football pitches will be protected by Rainforest Trust UK in the name of the winning club. The Green Football Weekend is being backed by former Liverpool players Jamie Carragher and Steve McManaman as well as the FA, the English Football League, and the Barclays Women’s Super League. Liverpool FC currently shares the prestigious title of the greenest club in the Premier League with Tottenham Hotspur, thanks to its Red Way strategy which was launched in January 2021. Through the initiative, the club has set ambitious targets to achieve sustainability throughout the organisation. Last season, Liverpool FC topped the Sport Positive Environmental Sustainability League and was named the Premiere League’s greenest club following a study carried out by BBC Sport and the UN-backed Sport Positive Summit. The club’s overall objective is to achieve net zero across its sport operations by the end of the 2022-23 season, which means the club will be implementing a robust carbon-reduction plan and offsetting any remaining carbon emissions. By 2025, the club also aims to have 100% of club operations run on low carbon energy and clean energy sources, and by 2030 to reduce actual operational carbon emissions by 50%. Ben Latty, LFC commercial director and executive sponsor of The Red Way, said: “Liverpool Football Club is very proud of the fantastic work that continues to be delivered as a result of our pioneering The Red Way sustainability initiative. “Green Football Weekend aligns very closely with the ongoing work of The Red Way and we’re delighted to give the campaign our official backing and encourage as many supporters as possible to get involved and make a difference. “As always, we’re acutely aware of the responsibility we hold as a global football club to help inspire and encourage positive behaviour change and hope our supporters step up to the challenge set by Green Football Weekend.” More than 80 football clubs are taking part in Green Football Weekend, a 20-day initiative that has seen football fans compete to score goals for their club by taking climate-friendly-actions. “In scoring green goals for their club, football fans have incredible power to help protect our world – and save money in the process,” said Green Football Weekend spokesperson, Sarah Jacobs. “If the UK’s 36 million fans adopted three climate-friendly habits across the course of the 20-day tournament, fans could save more than 700 million kg CO2e, the equivalent of planting 11.78 million trees.”