Predicting the future is never easy but where the environment is concerned it is increasingly clear that innovation and individualism are needed to push through or at least encourage wider changes.
One man and his football club have been doing just that and their different approach proves that making changes in order to benefit the planet need not be left to governments with a vested interest in big business.
How it began
Forest Green have been a football club since 1889 and herald from the small village of Nailsworth in Gloucestershire. Playing most of their early football in the regional leagues, it wasn’t until 1997-98 that they won the Southern Premier and were promoted to the Football Conference.
Over the next decade, the club established themselves in the top tier of non-league football avoiding relegation on a couple of occasions due to other side’s financial mismanagement. They appeared to have reached the pinnacle of what they could achieve based on the crowds and budget at their disposal; but then entered Dale Vince, a man with a vision.
Going green
When a new owner arrives at a football club it is often met with a wave of positivity and optimism. Dale Vince also brought with him a philosophy. He had made his money from his running an energy supplier specializing in renewables. Ecotricity generates power from solar, wind and frack-free gas sources and was the first power company to do so.
Vince brought these principles to Forest Green Rovers, turning the club into the first vegan football club in the world and making them the first carbon-neutral club for which they received a prestigious United Nations certificate and revolutionising the concept of how a football club can be run in a sustainable way.
The future
Forest Green are an example to others with the way they do things differently. Their players are on a vegan diet to stay in line with the club philosophy and it appears to be helping their performances. Other clubs may try similar innovations and would be wise to think outside of the box to find their way. They could, for example, encourage players to have psychic readings done by professionals: associated with helping people find clarity, this could very well help drive the players to better performances and so deliver success on the pitch. Football clubs regularly employ psychologists and reap the benefits – this could be the spiritual equivalent.
Fighting for the future transcends on-pitch performance, though. Dale Vince understands why innovation is important which is why his electricity supplier invests income back into developing new sources of renewable energy as well as investing in green alternatives such as electric cars, wind-powered tractors and other technologies.
The club plans to build a new £100 million Eco Park with a wooden, 5,000 seater stadium at its centre. Inside the 100-acre site, the plans include assets that can be enjoyed by the whole community including all-weather pitches, a gymnasium and – in keeping with the club’s green ethos – 1,800km of new hedgerow and 500 trees. This should turn the heads of larger clubs who, with the enormous space they have available to them, could enact similar changes of grandiose scale.
All of this just goes to show that if you want something badly enough it can be achieved. Governments talk of wide sweeping strategies to bring carbon emissions under control, but maybe they should look at the example of a small football club in rural England and rather than talking the talk, try walking the walk.
