With the 2026 Men’s World Cup on the horizon, excitement surrounding international football is understandably growing. Fans from all around the world are preparing to travel to Mexico, Canada and the US to cheer on their countries’ teams. Major sporting events like the World Cup feel like important, and increasingly rare, moments of international unity, but there is an unfortunate environmental cost to such events.

The last Men’s World Cup, hosted by Qatar in 2022, was responsible for producing 3.6 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO₂e). Over half of this was produced by travel (51.7%), with infrastructure construction (24.2%) and accommodation (20.1%) also contributing greatly.

The 2026 World Cup will be the largest ever, with 48 nations participating - 16 more than than the previous tournament format. The consequential increase of travelling teams and supporters will be a major contributor to the estimated total of 9.02 million tCO₂e that will be produced during the 2026 World Cup. Unlike Qatar, no new stadiums will be constructed for the tournament, meaning air travel will produce the majority of these greenhouse gas emissions.

This is a prominent environmental issue in football generally. UEFA’s expansion of the Champions League, Europa League and Europa Conference League for the 2024/25 season resulted in an additional 177 international football fixtures across Europe. Research suggests that this led to an extra 500 million air miles travelled by fans to support their teams, drastically inflating football’s overall carbon footprint.

Though travel is a major factor, it is not the only way in which football impacts the environment. A 2025 study estimated that up to 75% of football’s carbon footprint comes from sponsorship deals with high-carbon corporations such as fossil fuel companies and airlines. Such businesses can gain exposure to billions of global fans through such deals, and the increased sales or brand recognition that they gain has a significant knock-on effect on the environment - Qatar Airways, an official sponsorship partner of FIFA, reported a 100% increase in passenger revenue in the year following the 2022 World Cup.

Merchandise is another aspect of football club revenue that can leave significant marks on the environment. Premier League clubs sell approximately 10 million shirts annually, while another 16.2 million shirts are circulated on the black market. As football clubs release several new kits at the start of every season, fans often opt to buy new shirts every year. The carbon, water and waste footprints of football fashion is therefore enormous - in the UK alone, 100,000 tonnes of sportswear wind up in landfills every year, just to be replaced with new designs soon after.

What can be done?

Football risks becoming an increasingly sinister player on the global environmental stage. But there is hope. Clubs around the world are beginning to adopt tighter sustainability policies and climate impact regulations to limit the impact that football has on the planet.

In 2021, the Premier League signed up to the United Nations’ ‘Sports for Climate Action Framework’, committing to becoming net-zero by 2040. Several UK clubs (Arsenal, Liverpool, Tottenham and Newcastle) also opted to become independent signatories.

Grass roots action calling for sustainable football is also on the rise. In the UK, the annual Green Football Weekend mobilises fans to campaign for their clubs to follow new eco-friendly initiatives. Clubs like Forest Green Rovers have led the way in this, showcasing how sustainable construction practices and food sourcing can change, not only a club’s carbon footprint, but also the wider ethos surrounding the sport of football.

Change is also in motion at wider scales - UEFA joined the ‘UN Race to Zero’ campaign in 2022, striving to halve total emissions across all European football competitions by 2030. Two years later, UEFA launched the Carbon Footprint Calculator, a tool made for football clubs to track and manage their carbon emissions from travel, facilities and merchandise.

There is much to be hopeful about, but there is still a long way to go. In the world of contemporary football where money talks the loudest, it will take the collective voice of fans and players from all around the world to ensure that clubs and countries are doing all they can to reduce the environmental impact of our beautiful game.