FIFA is proud to call this summer’s World Cup the biggest in history, but it also tops another less desirable category: pollution.
By expanding the tournament’s participation from 32 teams to 48 teams and 64 matches to 108 teams, FIFA has ensured that it has achieved two main objectives. One is the public purpose of growing the game for the greater good, and the other is the private purpose of exponentially increasing revenue.
Under the leadership of Gianni Infantino, FIFA, world soccer’s governing body and non-profit organization, is making money. FIFA is predicted to earn $13bn (£9.6bn) over the four years to 2026. This is a 72% increase from the previous cycle.
Business is booming and the ticket sales system for the 2026 World Cup, which uses a much-criticized “dynamic pricing” structure, reflects this. The decision to stage the tournament across the United States, Canada and Mexico is firmly in line with the direction of travel under Coach Infantino, who has trumpeted the promise of “the greatest event in human history.”
And for critics, this is a decision that will increase the damage to the environment and move FIFA further away from achieving the goals it has set for itself.
The report, entitled FIFA’s climate blind spot, said the World Cup produced more than nine million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (MtCO2e), making it the most polluting World Cup in history. The estimated total is nearly double the historical average for previous tournaments from 2010 to 2022.
“We looked primarily at air travel, particularly in 2026, which is the biggest driver, because air travel spans the three largest countries,” global lead scientist Dr Stuart Parkinson, one of the report’s authors, told Mirror Football. “We estimated it to be about 9 million tonnes. We also estimated that sponsorship deals, particularly with Aramco, could increase emissions by 30 million tonnes.”
“This is a combination of expanding the tournament to 48 teams, 104 matches, and spreading it across the continent, which is completely the opposite of reducing emissions. FIFA has a net-zero target by 2040, but that only covers the organization itself, so it doesn’t include things like offices and staff travel, and it doesn’t include tournaments, so that’s their workaround.”
The 2026 World Cup will see record levels of air travel (Image: Rob Carr/Getty Images)
The World Cup will be held at 16 venues, from Vancouver in the north to Mexico City in the south. This means that air travel is the only real mode of transport, accounting for 7.72 million tonnes of the total estimated emissions of 9.02 million tonnes.
“This not only increases the tournament’s contribution to the climate crisis, but also highlights the gap between FIFA’s commitment to climate change and the reality of tournament planning,” the report said.
It also criticized FIFA’s wider commitment to tackling climate change, noting that of the 18 actions set out in its 2021 climate strategy, which pledged to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030 and to net zero by 2040, only two have been completed, and 14 actions show “no measurable progress”.
In response to detailed questions from Mirror Football, FIFA said it “recognizes the need to take climate impacts seriously and welcomes informed scrutiny” and “remains committed to ensuring continued engagement and transparency throughout the tournament cycle”.
Air travel is the only realistic option for the 2026 World Cup (Image: Doug Barrett / AFP via Getty Images)
FIFA pointed to the fact that, unlike the 2022 World Cup in Qatar and the 2034 edition in Saudi Arabia, this summer’s tournament will use existing infrastructure, “reducing the need for new construction and associated emissions.”
It also said it would “promote public transport, walking and cycling”, use “battery-based temporary power solutions” instead of diesel generators, promote recycling, reduce food waste and support tree-planting efforts. FIFA also plans to reinvest nearly 90% of its profits into development initiatives.
For some, there is another aspect of FIFA that shows its contradictions. Two years ago, the group signed a sponsorship deal worth $100m (£74m) a year with Saudi Arabia’s state oil company Aramco. Aramco, the third-highest carbon emitter in history after the former Soviet Union and Chinese coal, according to think tank Influence Maps, will be the star of this summer’s World Cup.
“FIFA works with an extensive global portfolio of partners, all of whom are subject to its governance and compliance framework,” the organization told Mirror Football. But for many people, those frameworks aren’t fit for purpose.
Gianni Infantino is close to Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (Image: Christopher Pike/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Dr Parkinson and his team estimated that FIFA, which aggressively promotes the world’s biggest oil giants to billions of viewers in a heat-affected tournament, would “cause approximately 30 million tCO2e of additional emissions due to increased sales of fossil fuel companies”.
The report, titled “Soccer Sets the World on Fire: How Saudi Aramco and FIFA are Driving the Climate Crisis,” said: “By combining the incredible power of advertising and the global cultural power of soccer, Saudi Arabia is using FIFA to help it extract every last barrel of its vast oil and gas reserves, with disastrous consequences for the planet.” They argue that while this agreement is the most worrying, it is also the most easily broken chain.
Peter Crisp, from campaign group Fossil Free Football, said: “Players and fans will struggle to survive the heat with big oil advertisements all around them. Like Saudi Aramco itself, FIFA is tied to oil profits with no plan to protect against climate change.” “The heatwave threatens not only this World Cup, but the survival of FIFA’s iconic summer tournament.
“FIFA promoting Aramco in 2026 is like promoting tobacco in sports over the past few decades. They know their business model is toxic, but wrapping their brand around football is a lifeline. But like Big Tobacco, it’s time to kick oil out.”
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