The Greenfinity Foundation will this year be presenting sponsor of the Lyoness Open for the third time. The partnership between Lyoness, The European Tour Green Drive and the Lyoness Greenfinity Foundation is committed to sustainable development in golf.
The partnership between Lyoness Greenfinity Foundation and The European Tour Green Drive is extremely beneficial, bringing together their mutual interests and synergies concerning the environmental opportunities and benefits around the game of golf.
The Lyoness Greenfinity Foundation provides the scientific evaluation system (calculator for the ecological footprint), The European Tour Green Drive’s delivery partner, the Golf Environment Organisation (GEO) provides expertise in the delivery of sustainable tournaments through improvement measures as well as their ISEAL accredited GEO certified standard around golf course management and operations.
The common goal is to ecologically improve tournaments on The European Tour International Schedule, and in doing so reduce their ecological footprints and deliver sustainable events.
Fredrik Lindgren, who heads up The European Tour Green Drive, said: “Greenfinity are really leading the way in sustainable golf tournaments – they set the standard for others to follow. They have approved year on year since they came on board as a presenting sponsor in 2011. This year, for example, they have lowered the carbon footprint left by the tournament by 30 per cent.
“The BMW courtesy cars are all hybrid models this year, as are the buses transporting the players from their hotels to the course. Plus all the food is supplied by local companies, and when spectators park in the car park, they are charged €1 which goes towards the forestation project in nearby Purkersdorf. So there are many innovations and activities which are aimed at reducing the events’ carbon footprint and raising awareness of sustainability.”
What is the ecological footprint?
The ‘ecological footprint’ is an evaluation tool for ecological and social impacts of activities, such as golf tournaments. It is a comprehensive indicator for sustainability developed by researchers at Graz University of Technology in 1994, and a metaphor for resource consumption in relation to the earth’s productive area. The ‘ecological footprint’ indicates how many hectares of productive land our planet has to provide in order to supply resources for an individual person, an event or a whole country as well as to absorb or recycle their waste.
The 2013 Lyoness Open
The Lyoness Open is the only European Tour event in Austria. In 2013, it welcomed more than 21,200 people. Altogether, more than 400 million households worldwide were reached via media.
For two years now, Greenfinity has worked on making the tournament more sustainable and implemented measures to reduce its ecological footprint. In 2013, several measures were taken, such as improving the waste management and sourcing local food suppliers. This resulted in a reduction of the ecological footprint by more than 30 per cent per person.
Despite improvements in the area of mobility (transport and transportation), this sector still causes 75 per cent of the Lyoness Open’s total footprint. For this reason, Greenfinity will implement concrete measures at the 2014 Lyoness Open in order to reduce the environmental impact caused by mobility.
The Greenfinity Foundation was also honoured for its commitment at the Lyoness Open: it took part in the competition “nachhaltig gewinnen” (or “winning sustainably”) and received an award for sustainable and eco-conscious sports events at the Green Events Austria Gala.
In terms of the size of the ecological footprint per person, each visitor to the 2013 Lyoness Open powered by Greenfinity had a 30% smaller footprint than that of a person using the internet for 24 hours.
The 2014 Lyoness Open powered by Greenfinity
This year, Greenfinity is taking further measures to reduce the tournament’s ecological footprint. Greenfinity will maintain the initiatives of 2013, as well as working on implementing new ones, mainly in order to make improvements in the area of mobility. The aim in 2014 is to improve transport routes to the Lyoness Open, and to offer alternative modes of transport from individual car journeys.
Measures taken to ecologically improve the 2014 Lyoness Open
• Using e-cars for shuttle service
• Offering shuttle buses and reducing emissions
• Increasing the use of the local power grid and reducing the use of diesel generators
• Using local and regional food
• Enhancing cooperation with local companies and reducing transport routes
• Improving the waste management concept
• No air conditioning
Activities to reduce the ecological footprint at the Lyoness Open:
• Visitors have the opportunity to determine their personal ecological footprint.
• The footprint determined can be compensated by supporting the reforestation project in Germany and Nicaragua.
• Donations at the frozen yogurt stand benefit the “Generationenwald” (generations’ forest) in Purkersdorf near Diamond Country Club.
• Parking area: € 1 per parking ticket benefits the “Generationenwald” (generations’ forest) in Purkersdorf.
