Red Sox Get Bigger Footprint: Sprawling Spring Park Skimps on Green

Given that Fenway Park is a green diamond, I was surprised to find on a recent trip to Florida that the new Boston Red Sox spring training facility, is the least-environmentally conscious new sports venue I've visited in recent years. And if they couldn't get JetBlue Park's green right, is it any wonder they also screwed up the height of its Green Monster?

"Environmentally-sustainable features will be incorporated throughout the facility and Complex, and the considerable landscaping will feature vegetation indigenous to the area," reads the JetBlue Park website. It's hard to tell exactly what that means, or whether more ambitious environmental efforts will be undertaken down the road. But how do you build a new ballpark with no solar panels in Florida, one of the states most threatened by global warming?

JetBlue Park's meager positive environmental measures are more than offset by its sprawling location. While its predecessor, City of Palms Stadium, was located in the center of the city, JetBlue Park is 10 miles outside central Fort Myers. That meant the vast majority of fans had to drive and most of them came came off the same exit of I-75, backing up traffic for miles. Even if the stadium was powered with 100% renewable energy, its carbon footprint would still be high because it asks 12,000 fans each game to drive so far outside the city.

And the fans who did take advantage of the ideal biking weather in Florida in March didn't get an ideal reception:

For the grand opening of jetBlue Park, 300 people biked to the new stadium. Those cyclists saved about 2-3 acres of parking. When asked, 76-percent of the bicyclists said they wanted to bike to future games. But jetBlue Park only has permanent bike racks for 50 bikes, with some temporary French barricades on standby.

Given the messed-up Monster, bad traffic and brutally long lines at concession stands, I didn't find the dearth of environmental amenities surprising. I've come to think of a venue's lack of green features as Van Halen viewed brown M&Ms - a warning sign that someone's just going through the motions. Poor environmental planning often goes hand in hand with a poorly thought-out overall customer experience.

Nationals Park Falling Behind in Green Rankings

I have to say ... The Green Miles was a little disappointed in this video. I mean, no one loves the Washington Nationals' green diamond more than me ... but this video could've been made the day the park opened four seasons ago. The Nats have seriously upgraded their team since 2008 - why not their green efforts as well?

When Nationals Park opened in 2008, it was the first U.S. Green Building Council Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)-certified ballpark in Major League Baseball, achieving the "silver" standard. But since then, the Minnesota Twins have opened Target Field, also LEED silver-certified (and a much better place to watch a game, arguably the best in baseball). And the Pittsburgh Penguins opened a LEED gold-certified arena.

And all of those stadiums have been passed by a college facility. The University of Florida's Heavener Football Complex is LEED platinum-certified, the highest possible rating.

So how can the Nats get back on top?

• Renewable energy. If the Boston Red Sox can put solar panels on Fenway Park, there's no reason why the Nats can't have some as well. Even the Washington Redskins, whose owner is no friend of the environment and who manage to screw up almost everything else, have installed a sizable solar array at FedEx Field.
• Put the players out front. Nationals pitcher Collin Balester is part of Players for the Planet, speaking out on the need for recycling & climate action. Why not include him in these clips along with the front office staff?
• Tear down the awful parking garages. Not only are they eyesores that block views of the Capitol, not only do they sit empty most of the time, but they encourage driving to a park that's next to one Metro stop and a 15 minute walk from several others. Imagine how much revenue the Nats could recapture from The Bullpen across the street by turning the garage space into an inviting area to eat, drink, shop and socialize. Yes, I know DC paid tens of millions of dollars to build the garages. But letting the mistake stand won't get that money back.
• Stop selling ads on everything to polluters. It's not quite in the same league as Pittsburgh's "green" arena selling its naming rights to a polluting coal company. But the Exxon Mobil-sponsored left field wall billboard, Exxon Mobil-sponsored 7th inning stretch, Exxon Mobil-sponsored organic cotton hat, and Exxon Mobil-sponsored stadium replica really distract from the Nats' efforts to show they care about the environment & public health.

Finally, how's this for a headline: Nationals Sign Local Environmental Blogger as Left-Handed Reliever! Think about it, Mike Rizzo.

Green Diamonds III: Avast! Pirates Pillage Yer Recyclables

So far in this week's Green Diamonds series, I've looked at the Boston Red Sox, one of baseball's biggest money-makers, and the Washington Nationals, recipients of one of the biggest public subsidies in sports history.

Other big-money teams like the New York Yankees and well-financed teams like the Minnesota Twins are kicking off green efforts. But for the final installment of the series, I thought I'd look at the other end of the revenue scale. Can a team that's known for being a cheapskate go green?

As the Pittsburgh Pirates are proving with their "Let's Go Bucs, Let's Go Green" program, the answer is yes.

The initiative was developed in conjunction with the Natural Resources Defense Council. Features include:

• Recycling bottles, cans and cardboard
• Using hand towels and toiled paper made from recycled materials
• All office paper, stationery and business cards will be made of recyclable materials
• Cutting paper use by copying on both sides
• Installing motion sensors and using more energy-efficient bulbs
• Switching to biodegradable cups and utensils
  

Here's my favorite part:

The players will have to step up, too.

"Players and/or clubbies will have to find the receptacles that say bottles and cans as well," Pirates President Frank Coonelly said after a news conference.

Will recycling and using more sustainable materials cost the Pirates more? Sure. But they'll be more than offset by their reduced total paper usage and energy savings.

Of course, if you're a Pirates fan, you have only one question: Will some of those savings be put into, y'know, getting better players? Only time will tell.

Tuesday - Green Diamonds I: Nats Open MLB's First Green Ballpark
Wednesday - Green Diamonds II: The Monster Gets a Makeover
Thursday - Green Diamonds III: Avast! Pirates Pillage Yer Recyclables

Green Diamonds II: The Monster Gets a Makeover

As I covered in Part I of this week's Green Diamonds series, sometimes the greenest building is the one that's already built. Nowhere is that more true than at Boston's Fenway Park.

It's green as in:

• Promoting public transportation. As Alexander Wolff wrote in Sports Illustrated's recent article on green stadiums, "The greenest ballpark in the country may be Fenway Park, because only an idiot would try driving and parking there."
• Making money. Where else would people pay exorbitant sums to cram into tiny seats that often don't even point towards the field and have obstructed views anyway? But it's a cathedral of baseball that your dad took you to when you were seven and Yaz hit one out. Like the Field of Dreams, you pass over the money without even thinking about it.
• The Monster.

The Red Sox are partnering with the Natural Resources Defense Council on a series of changes that will culminate in 2012, Fenway Park's centennial. But as Business Week points out, this ain't window dressing. The team is looking for whatever edge it can get:

Whatever approach they take, one thing is certain: Big league sports teams have always obsessed over numbers—stats, attendance figures, salaries, TV ratings—now they’re beginning to run the numbers on carbon footprints, fuel prices, electric meters, and LEED scorecards.

Some of the green features have obvious secondary benefits. When the Red Sox renovated the field to include a sand filtration layer that moderates runoff into the city storm drains, they also smoothed the playing surface, upgrading it from one of the worst infields in baseball to one of the best. Reusing bricks as part of reconstruction doesn't just reduce waste, it maintains Fenway's historic feel.

The Red Sox will also install solar panels, expand their recycling program to cover bottles, and include more locally-grown and organic produce in its concession stand offerings.

And really, no matter what the economic or environmental reasons the Red Sox give, I think we all know the real reason they're going green: Because I sort of bitched about it last year.

Tuesday - Green Diamonds I: Nats Open MLB's First Green Ballpark
Wednesday - Green Diamonds II: The Monster Gets a Makeover
Thursday - Green Diamonds III: Avast! Pirates Pillage Yer Recyclables

Green Diamonds I: Nats Open MLB's First Green Ballpark

The Green Miles is a bit groggy today, having woken up at 5:45am to watch the Red Sox beat the A's in the TokyoDome as Major League Baseball opened the 2008 season.

As the new season kicks off, I thought I'd take a look at some teams that are reducing their environmental impact without adding significantly to their costs.

I'll start right across the river in Washington, DC, where the Nationals are getting ready to open the first LEED-certified ballpark in the majors. As you can see, it's ready for the first home game on Saturday, an exhibition against the Baltimore Orioles.

Architects say LEED certification added just $2 million to the stadium's costs, a fraction of one percent of the total. Or in baseball terms, less than the cost of a free agent middle reliever. And some of those costs will be quickly recovered. High-efficiency field lighting uses 21% less energy than standard lighting.

What some may see as Nationals Park's design flaw is actually its biggest environmental plus. As these Peeps helpfully demonstrate, it's going to be difficult to drive to Nationals Park and even harder to park there. The vast majority of fans will take public transportation.

More facts snipped from Fast Company magazine:

The 6,317-square-foot green roof over a concession area is planted with about 1,200 drought-resistant sedums. A donation from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation covered the $100,000 cost.

The first-of-its-kind wastewater system uses sand filters calibrated to a ballpark's unique needs -- for instance, it's designed to screen out organic debris such as peanut shells and hot-dog bits. The engineers claim that water that has gone through the system is cleaner than the water in the nearby Anacostia River.

An in-house recycling center is equipped with four 34-cubic-yard dumpster-compactors, big enough to handle the glass, metal, and plastic recyclables generated during one three-day home stand.

For those of us who don't speak horticulturese, sedums basically = hardy shrubs.

Of course, the National Trust for Historic Preservation often makes the case that the greenest building is the one that's already built. Would it have been more environmentally-friendly for the Nats to renovate RFK? While The Green Miles is not a scientist and does not even get to play one on TV, I'll say probably. The material and energy it takes to build a new stadium from scratch probably outweighs the negatives of RFK's non-LEED building and massive surface parking lots. But DC wanted to blow half a billion dollars on a new ballfield, so that's that!

Wednesday - Green Diamonds II: The Monster Gets a Makeover
Thursday - Green Diamonds III: Avast! Pirates Pillage Yer Recyclables