Gas and oil companies “pollute” sport with $5.6 billion in partnership, according to a study – Libération

340 million dollars invested by TotalEnergies, 470 million dollars for its competitor Shell, or even 1.3 billion dollars financed by the Saudi company Aramco, world leader in oil… “Fossil company sponsorships” Who “pollute sport” and their enormous amounts are at the heart of a new study published this Wednesday, September 18 by the New Weather Institute.

Rugby World Cup sponsor

The organization behind the publication, a think tank dedicated to the ecological transition, decided to identify the sponsorships that link the gas and oil giants with different sporting structures. No less than 205 of these commercial links have been identified. Football, the king of sports in the world, has signed 59 of these staggering sponsorships, for a total budget of 994 million dollars. Just behind, motor sports attract 40 sponsorships but obtain 2.8 billion dollars in return. In total, the study scrutinizes 19 sporting disciplines, including rugby, golf, ice hockey and cycling, all affected by multi-million dollar agreements.

Another example, TotalEnergies sponsored the Rugby World Cup in Paris in 2023. But under fire from criticism, the oil giant had to remain discreet in the fan zones. Indeed, it had been the target of actions by Extinction Rebellion activists, who had poured oil in front of the French Rugby Federation to protest against the presence of the group.

“The future of athletes” under threat

However, of all the agreements identified, only 41 make their data public, so the New Weather Institute had to make estimates based on similar sponsorships. The authors of the study then put the total amount of this financing at $5.6 billion. The authors of the report deplore in particular an increasingly strong presence of States from the Near and Middle East in the financing of sport. The report estimates that $4.5 billion was invested in sports leagues and clubs by Gulf countries between 2022 and 2023.

Andrew Simms, co-director of the New Weather Institute, warns in a press release about the pollution and environmental damage generated by these industries, which “threaten the very future of athletes, fans and events from the Winter Olympics to the World Cups. If sport wants to have a future, it must get rid of the dirty money of big polluters and stop promoting its own destruction».

The study cites climatic disasters which had a direct impact on sporting competitions, such as fires linked to a drought which disrupted the Australian Tennis Open in 2020, or even Typhoon Hagabis which occurred during the World Cup. rugby 2019 in Japan.