10 Sept, 2024
Reuse: Citius, Altius, Fortius - Communiter
by Fernando RodrÃguez-Mata
What lessons can we learn about reuse in events from the Paris Olympic Games?
I have always been passionate about the Olympics. As a teenager, I would spend those long, hot Spanish summer days glued to the TV, binge-watching the Games. Destiny offered me a first-hand opportunity to participate as a volunteer at London 2012. The experience was so incredible that I did it again in Rio 2016. Then COVID hit, making it impossible to attend Tokyo. But when I found out the 2024 Games would be hosted in my country of residence, I couldn’t pass up the chance. So, for two weeks last summer, I put on the volunteer uniform once more, this time as a team leader for the event services crew at the football stadium in Lyon.
I guess this close bond with the Games makes me assess my life in Olympiads. Namely, the four-year lapse between two Olympic Games. When the event arrives, I look back to reflect on how I have evolved throughout this period. My last Olympiad was prolific in life changing events. On a personal level, I became the father of a lovely daughter. On the professional side, I saw the birth of another baby: New ERA, the New European Reuse Alliance. Although in this case the paternity belongs to various inspiring business leaders across Europe.
The episodes you go through tend to shift the lens through which you view the Games. In that sense, I paid special attention to sustainability during Paris 2024. These Games were set to be the greenest in modern history. The Organising Committee made significant efforts to deliver a more circular, sustainable, and environmentally respectful event, notably by:
- prioritising leasing instead of buying goods
- reducing energy consumption and fostering use of renewable energy
- pushing for a more local, plant-based food
- promoting public transport for a lower-emission mobility
- refurbishing iconic places to turn them into sports venues (95% of the infrastructure already existed or was temporary)
- reusing a wide array of products like furniture, including controverted cardboard boxes for the athlete’s bed bases
However, the Games also fell short in some of the announced ambitious promises, such as becoming single use plastic free. In the field of packaging, I ended up with a bittersweet taste. The French company and New ERA member Re-uz was chosen to put in place a reuse system for drink and food containers across all venues. It was the first time such models were implemented at the Olympic Games, marking a significant stride for the reuse industry. Despite the joy surrounding this accomplishment, their novelty may explain why there is still ample room for improvement in achieving a truly zero-waste event. In particular, two key elements deserve closer attention and revision:
- Designing branded, stylish containers is an incentive for consumers to keep them after use, even with a deposit (2 euros at Paris 2024). Makes for a nice souvenir! The issue isn’t just lower return rates, but the limited number of times reusable packaging can be used. Even if consumers return the containers, they will only be used two or three times before being discarded and recycled. Their lifespan is as short as the event itself. So if we are serious about implementing robust reuse systems for events, we need to make unbranded and basic containers the norm. Re-uz, Wobz, and many other of our members offer generic containers for rental that can be mutualised between different service providers and be reused as many times as possible regardless of the event they were first designed for. How beautiful it would be if a reusable cup could withstand an entire Olympiad. The cup would look back on its four year journey marvelled at the number of places it discovered: from festivals to stadiums, passing by cinemas and theatres. There are already great examples to get inspired from like the Change NOW Summit: in this year’s edition, food and drinks were served in reusable generic packaging, achieving an outstanding return rate of 98% for cups and 100% for food boxes.
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- Adopting the diversity of reuse solutions available is paramount to have a real positive impact for cutting material use and waste generation. This implies making not just the cup reusable, but all the packaging used along the value chain. It was nonsensical to see single use plastic bottles stored in the fridges only to be poured into reusable cups. This approach merely shifts the waste problem one step back in the process. Rather, we should deploy refill stations to avoid single-use bottles (partially done in some of the competition sites), and transport goods in reusable crates and boxes, protected by reusable wraps. We also need to make it easier and convenient for consumers to return packaging. By providing the necessary infrastructure, we can eliminate long wait times and streamline the process of getting back their used containers. Further, we can leverage state-of-the-art technology to trace packaging when needed, ensuring a seamless redistribution into the chain once the containers are washed or reconditioned.
It’s hard to say if Paris 2024 were the most sustainable Games of all. Tokyo certainly had a much lower environmental footprint because of all those empty stadiums and the flights that were avoided. But that’s not the point either. The objective must be finding the balance between having the least possible impact while allowing us to celebrate one of the most special events in the world. And that’s precisely the beauty of reuse: it enables us to keep enjoying our daily treats while preserving our scarce resources, making us less dependent on the access to raw materials and their fluctuating costs. In short, reuse needs to be implemented faster to obtain higher environmental and economic benefits, and for that we need stronger financial incentives from both the public and private sector: only together can we achieve this. Let’s get down to business to make reuse the norm in Los Angeles 2028!
