The Greening of the Olympic Games

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has been working closely with the Beijing Olympic Committee for the past three years to make the Summer Olympic Games environmentally-friendly. The Chinese government has spent billions of dollars to launch a large-scale green drive ahead of the games including a series of long-term environmental improvements for the city. Among these are the introduction of tougher standards for vehicle emissions, expanded public transport network with three new subway lines, and the introduction of the natural gas buses. In addition, the Olympic venues use 20% energy from clean wind sources, 2,000 square meters of solar power facilities, with the Bird’s Nest stadium having an advanced rainwater recycling system.

The UNEP Director Achim Steiner will visit  the Beijing Olympic Games as well as see these facilities first hand. In the second half of 2008, UNEP will produce a Post-Games Environmental Report to assess the successes and challenges of the environmental measures taken by Beijing for the 2008 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

For details, see press release at: http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=540&ArticleID=5885&l=en