SUSTAINABILITY
stadium to achieve Leadership in Energy and
Environmental Design (LEED) Platinum certification.
Using green materials was integral to earning the
rating, where engineers replaced 2.8 million kilograms
(6.2 million lbs) of Portland cement with fly ash, which
is the equivalent of offsetting the electrical carbon
production for three years. Meanwhile, 20% of
materials were recycled and 47% derived from regional
materials. Wind turbines also provided, and continue
to do so, a third of the energy to support Apogee
Stadium’s annual electricity consumption.
Streets ahead
Another important theme in modern stadium
development, which is related to sustainability, is the
tendency to build stadia in downtown areas. Kestner
advised on the 2014 development of the Southwest
University minor league baseball stadium, in El Paso,
Texas, which helped to revive a decaying downtown
area and reached LEED Gold certification. As is quite
common for inner city developments, the El Paso
Stadium presented logistical challenges to the engineers
with a tight and irregular space to work in. Just 160ft
(48m) from the home plate stood a large concrete
retaining wall, separating the edge of the site’s outfield
from a railroad. “We had to make the ballpark taller
than usual and it had to be cantilevered and hang over
the adjacent railway. There were further engineering
gymnastics to avoid loading the retaining wall. But
we wedged it into the small space without new parking,
which is uncommon in the US. As a result, it catalyzed
some urban development in the city center,” he says.
Elaine Aye, associate regional manager and
sustainability consultant at specialty engineers RWDI,
explains that the Golden 1 Center, home to the NBA’s
Sacramento Kings, is a good illustration of how a move
downtown can have a positive environmental impact.
The team’s owners calculated that it reduced travelrelated
greenhouse gas emissions per fan by 36%,
compared to games at their old stadium situated on
the outskirts of the city. Meanwhile, more than 90%
The University of North Texas’
Apogee Stadium was built
from green materials to offset
its carbon production and
employs wind-powered
turbines to provide energy
of food from concessions is being sourced from local
businesses and farms within 150 miles (240km).
“Stadia such as the Golden 1 Center can transform
downtown cores. The sustainability aspects come,
especially, when the development is tied to local
transportation management and there’s a plan to
get masses of people to the venue without singleoccupancy
vehicles. We’re seeing stadia integrated
with downtown commerce, the hotel market, science,
technology and education. This helps make downtown
areas sustainable in the broader sense,” Aye claims.
Aye, who is also a board member of environmental
organization, the Green Sports Alliance, echoes
Kestner’s belief that sustainability concerns are
transforming approaches to design. In the recent past,
the focus was mainly on energy efficiency, water
consumption and waste reduction, but there is now
a wider definition of sustainability. “When we speak
to designers, architects and engineers now, we stress
how climate change has made the concept of resiliency
more important,” she says.
WEATHERING THE STORM
(Main and bottom right)
Southwest University’s baseball
stadium in El Paso, Texas
helped revive a decaying
downtown area and has
a LEED Gold certification
When Hurricane Sandy devastated densely populated areas
across several US states in 2012, stadia acted as refuges, but
too many were poorly prepared, becoming too hot for comfort
and lacking food and water. “When designing, or upgrading,
a stadium now, there’s more emphasis on comfort. We ask
designers to look at cooling, shading, glare control, and
appropriate air flow to ensure the building will function as a safe
and comfortable environment for people in the event of a disaster
or if there’s no power for period of time. This is a significant new
direction for stadium design, but we are in the early stages
of these conversations,” says RWDI’s Elaine Aye.
34 www.stadia-magazine.com June 2019
/www.stadia-magazine.com
/www.stadia-magazine.com