With solar panels, recycled stadium seats and rainwater sprinklers, Brazil hopes to make the 2014 Soccer World Cup the most environmentally friendly yet.
At a dozen stadium construction and renovation sites around the country, builders are hoping to meet or even exceed new FIFA recommendations aimed at reducing the carbon footprint of the world’s biggest sporting event.
“We are no longer accepting engineering works that do not take into account environmental sustainability,” said the head of the Sao Paulo architecture and engineering syndicate (Sinaenco-SP), Jose Roberto Bernasconi.
Photo: AFP
Brazilian authorities are racing to build or renovate 12 stadiums in time for the event and Brazilian Sports Minister Aldo Rebelo pledged earlier this month that work on the venues would largely be completed ahead of schedule.
However, FIFA president Sepp Blatter expressed concerns over the weekend about Brazil’s preparations and other top officials have complained about the lack of infrastructure and poor public transport and roads.
At the Governor Magalhaes Pinto Stadium in the southeastern city of Belo Horizonte, planners say they have exceeded the world football body’s sustainability guidelines and are looking to secure an official certification from the US Green Building Council.
Renovators of the stadium — first built in 1965 — are adding a 22.7 million litre rainwater collection system and are deliberately sourcing materials locally to reduce fuel emissions.
All of the concrete removed from the original structure was reused in the renovations or other nearby projects, about 800,000 cubic meters of dirt removed from the site was used to patch up mining damage and the original 50,000 seats were donated to local stadiums and gymnasiums.
“Everything was reused. There was no other waste or discarded materials that could have been reused,” Vinicius Lott of the state government’s Sustainable Cup project said.
Builders plan to install about 6,000 solar panels on the roof to provide electricity to about 1,500 nearby homes.
“There’s an idle roof receiving a lot of sunlight. So we decided to cover it with photovoltaic cells and turn it into a solar power plant,” said an electrical engineer involved in the project, Alexander Heringer.
The US$6.5 million solar plant will generate about 1.5 megawatts per hour — a tiny fraction of the thousands of megawatts produced by a hydroelectric dam — but the costs should be fully recovered during its 25-year lifespan.
The operating costs are also expected to be “very cheap” because the panels would require little maintenance and would be cleaned by rainwater, Heringer said.
Brazil plans to offer an international tender for the panels — which cannot be manufactured domestically — and Heringer said German, Chinese, Korean, Spanish and Italian firms have expressed interest.
After the stadium’s completion, the state government plans to launch similar solar projects at another stadium and an international airport.
Belo Horizonte, with about 2.5 million residents, expects to host six 2014 World Cup matches and three Confederations Cup matches in 2013.
The city — Brazil’s sixth largest — plans to welcome 100,000 tourists during the World Cup and the Minas Gerais state expects up to US$2.8 billion in both public and private investments leading up to the event.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of
IN PURSUIT: Israel’s defense minister said the revenge attacks by Israeli settlers would make it difficult for security forces to find those responsible for the 14-year-old’s death Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday condemned the “heinous murder” of an Israeli teenager in the occupied West Bank as attacks on Palestinian villages intensified following news of his death. After Benjamin Achimeir, 14, was reported missing near Ramallah on Friday, hundreds of Jewish settlers backed by Israeli forces raided nearby Palestinian villages, torching vehicles and homes, leaving at least one villager dead and dozens wounded. The attacks escalated in several villages on Saturday after Achimeir’s body was found near the Malachi Hashalom outpost. Agence France-Presse correspondents saw smoke rising from burned houses and fields. Mayor Amin Abu Alyah, of the