Winter Tryout and Climate Justice

This is an exciting moment for us. This will be the first time we’re bringing our mission directly to players and it is our first glimpse of our competitive potential on the pitch. While our coaching staff focuses on talent, we’re focusing our efforts on education and spreading awareness of climate justice. We’re also neutralizing the tryout carbon footprint and providing players with a sustainably-sourced tryout tee that helps us spread our message. First thing’s first though, let’s discuss what climate justice is and why we’re focused on it.

Climate Action Requires Climate Justice

If you’re scratching your head about why a soccer club thinks climate change is a big deal, well, my friend, you have truly been living under a stump somewhere in the Green Mountain National Forest. We really are going to need you to dig your head out of the humus – the climate is changing fast and we have the team effort of all team efforts on our hands to address the climate crisis. We’ll be posting more blogs and social media that break down the details of climate change, how much time is left before we trigger irreversible climate chaos, and how to think about and take responsibility for our individual climate responsibilities – stay tuned for those. For the purposes of this post, we’ll be sticking close to the particulars of climate justice. 

The argument at the heart of climate justice is that the adverse impacts of climate change are experienced inequitably across peoples and geographies. The unfair and partial manner that climate change delivers its blows is due to existing social inequities that historically marginalized peoples face around the world. Moreover, marginalized peoples have typically contributed the least to the problem. Climate justice is an approach to correct these inequities through climate action. Activists in the global south were the first to propose this model in response to the climate threats they were facing in their homelands, which exacerbated human rights and social justice challenges. 

These concerns, however, are still mostly being sidelined at international climate conferences and among transnational corporations. Although global efforts have yet to fully embrace climate justice, it has made its way into the international discussion on climate action and is now widely used by researchers, NGOs, politicians, and some corporations seeking to address the climate crisis and related injustices throughout society. And this is where we can make a difference. As constituents and consumers, we can show elected leaders and corporations that equity can and must be our guidepost for climate solutions. We can show solidarity in this approach and use whatever tools and platforms we have to promote it.

Summary:

• Climate justice acknowledges that the adverse impacts of climate change are not experienced equitably across peoples and geographies. The unfair and partial manner that climate change delivers its blows is due to existing social inequities that historically marginalized peoples face around the world. Moreover, marginalized peoples have typically contributed the least to the problem.

• Climate justice is still a significant point of contention at global climate conferences and among transnational corporations. We have the power to transform the debate through our personal advocacy. 

Climate Justice is Social Justice

As previously noted, the adverse impacts of climate change – think the increasing intensity and frequency of severe heat waves, drought, wildfires, flooding, hurricanes, tropical storms, rising sea levels, and the list goes on – exacerbate existing inequitable social conditions. This adds up to greater risks and burdens placed upon historically marginalized peoples. Mary Robinson, former President of Ireland and current Chair of the Elders, put it this way, climate justice “insists on a shift from a discourse on greenhouse gases and melting ice caps into a civil rights movement with the people and communities most vulnerable to climate impacts at its heart.” The communities and people she is speaking of represent, among others, low-income communities, BIPOC, people with disabilities, older or younger people, and women. Again, many of these vulnerable peoples have contributed the least to the problem. An analogous situation has been playing out since the start of the Pandemic – COVID19 has disproportionately impacted historically marginalized people and communities, increasing multiple kinds of inequities. 

Of course, marginalized peoples aren’t monoliths, and the risks and burdens of climate change differ between people and communities. Yale Climate Connections offers some examples of what these disparities look like: 

• Communities of color are often more at risk from air pollution, according to the NAACP, the American Lung Association, and countless research papers.
• Seniors, people with disabilities, and people with chronic illnesses may have a harder time living through periods of severe heat, or being able to quickly and safely evacuate from major storms or fire.
• People with limited income may live in subsidized housing, which is too often located in a flood plain. Their housing options may also have inadequate insulation, mold problems, or air conditioning to effectively combat severe heat or cope with strong storms. Economically challenged people may also be hard-pressed to afford flood or fire insurance, rebuild homes, or pay for steep medical bills after catastrophe strikes.
• Language barriers can make it difficult for immigrant communities to get early information about incoming storms or weather disasters or wildfires, or to communicate effectively with first responders in the midst of an evacuation order.
• Some indigenous communities are already seeing their homes and livelihoods lost to rising sea levels or drought. For example, the Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw tribe has lost nearly all of its land and is relocating to higher ground.
• Prolonged drought and flooding can affect food supply or distribution, making it harder for people to access affordable, healthy food.
• Today’s youth and future generations will experience more profound impacts of climate change as it worsens over time, from direct adverse health impacts to the financial implications of needing to shore-up infrastructure and other adaptation and mitigation needs.

These are the faces of the people footing a disproportionate amount of the climate bill. If this strikes you as unfair, you’re getting the point. Developed countries and transnational corporations have to take more responsibility for addressing this unfairness by acknowledging their historical and current contributions and demonstrating leadership. After all, developed countries and corporations have built significant wealth polluting our atmosphere without accounting for the costs to our entire global community. Meanwhile, the rest of us can’t wait around for what leadership may or may not do. We too have a responsibility for getting clear on our individual contribution to the climate action puzzle. So let’s be clear. Those of us who have benefitted from a lucky turn of the cosmic roulette wheel have to reflect on our own privileges and responsibilities. Ask yourself, were you born into an economically developed country with access to public services and other advantages? Have you had access to products, services, jobs, and upward mobility afforded by large corporations? Have you grown up in a family with a stable financial situation? These are just an entree into the broader conversation of personal privilege and responsibility in a world of immense and intensifying environmental risks and burdens. And this conversation need not be about shaming or blaming ourselves or others. Has that ever helped to motivate anyone anyway? Instead of wasting our energy, accepting our privilege and responsibility with an attitude of gratitude can provide the positive energy we actually need to stay motivated and inspired. Let’s tell cynicism to take a hike. 

The point we’re trying to make here is we don’t have to wait for climate action; in fact, we can’t. We have about a decade to halve global GHG pollution. We can no longer expect the environment, historically marginalized peoples, and future generations to foot the bill for excessive pollution and unsustainable natural resource consumption. We are all in the midst of an all-hands-on-deck emergency, which means those of us who have benefitted from polluting our atmosphere, whether we knew it or not, must contribute to transforming the current climate trajectory by living the change we wish to see in the world, and paying forward our privilege by advancing climate justice in our own lives. 

Summary:

• Developed countries and transnational corporations have built significant wealth polluting our atmosphere without accounting for the costs to our entire global community. Many of us make up these countries and corporations. If you’ve lived in a developed country, perhaps you’ve benefited from public services and other advantages. If you’ve purchased a product or service or worked for a corporation, perhaps you’ve experienced some quality of life benefits. Those of us who make up developed countries or corporations are all in a position to reflect upon, take responsibility for, and pay forward our privileges so low-income communities, BIPOC, people with disabilities, older or younger people, women, and future generations aren’t bearing the greatest climate burdens.

Seeking Climate Justice

As you might have surmised, climate justice can look like many things and can show up in both our words and actions. We’ll start with the actions because as you know, they speak louder than words. Players and staff will be encouraged to reduce their footprint by carpooling, taking public transportation, and walking and biking locally if weather permits. Once we’ve collected all travel information and reduced emissions where possible, all remaining emissions will be offset with verified carbon credits from a project that advances climate justice. We have yet to discover a definitive list of climate justice criteria for verified carbon credits, so we’re using some questions informed by our research to help us identify an appropriate project. What follows is a working and non-exhaustive list of some criteria that we look for in carbon offsetting projects:

Project criteria:

• Verifiably reduces greenhouse gas emissions. 
• Developed in collaboration with the local community. 
• The local community controls some or all of project development and management.
• Supports local economic development and entrepreneurship.
• If financial assistance is provided, it is appropriately structured to local socio-economic conditions and is non-predatory.
• Reduces living expenses for project participants in the local community.
• Provides clean, renewable, locally controlled, and low-impact energy resources.
• Affords all people, including the poor, women, rural and indigenous peoples, the right to accessible, affordable and sustainable energy.
• Affords communities dependent on natural resources for their livelihood and cultures the right to own and manage those resources in a sustainable manner.
• Opposes the commodification of nature and its resources.
• Provides opportunities to improve health outcomes in the local community. 
• Reduces demand for fossil fuels.

For further reading, we’ve listed some of our favorite climate justice resources at the end of this post.

Wearing Our Commitment

We are providing sustainably-sourced sport tees for trialists that are intended to promote the connection between climate justice and social justice. In addition to the message, the way they’re made also matters. We chose to work with Recover Brand because they have a game-changing business model that sets them apart in the apparel industry. They use technology to upcycle polyester, cotton, and blended fabrics into new clothing. This means they can take back everything they sell, keeping it out of the landfill. This circular model is a significant departure from the industry’s conventional, linear approach of take, make, use, and waste. Keeping our clothing in circulation and out of landfills reduces carbon, water, plastic, and waste pollution. Circularity also reduces the demand for virgin materials. This all adds up to less pressure on the natural environment. Indeed, our ecosystems are under immense pressure and we aren’t giving them the time they require to regenerate and function properly. Consider this: we burn or landfill one garbage truck of clothing every second, which is enough to fill 1.5 Empire State Buildings every day. 

If we take care of nature, nature takes care of us. Ecosystem services are life-sustaining services we enjoy free of charge – they clean our air and water, stabilize our climate, enhance biodiversity, and produce fertile environments for the cultivation of medicines and food, just to name a few. But we’re no longer caring for nature on a global scale. In the last 50 or so years, we’ve officially exceeded the Earth’s capacity to regenerate many of the natural resources we use to power our economies and lifestyles. In addition to climate change, the impacts are already apparent in extensive soil erosion, reduced cropland productivity, overgrazing, deforestation, desertification, fisheries collapse, and rapid species extinction. It doesn’t have to be this way. Circularity advises us to think more like nature, which wastes nothing and recycles everything in continuous loops. If we don’t align our thinking with how the natural environment functions, we’re signing ourselves and future generations for some dire consequences. In 2020, around 30 million people were displaced by weather and climate hazards. Now imagine a world where over 1 billion people are displaced by climate change. By 2050, that could be the world we live in. That is our choice of course. The beautiful thing is each of us is able to choose how we wish to contribute to a better future, and thinking circularly, learning from nature, is how we’ll get there. In practice, a great place to start is to choose one thing you own and do some thinking and research on the entire lifecycle of that item.

For example, let’s consider some questions we should be asking while looking for some new clothing:

1. Where does my clothing go at the end of its useful life? 
2. Where did my clothing start its life? 
3. What went into its production? 
4. Who was involved in creating the materials and manufacturing the clothing? 
5. How were those people treated? 
6. How was it distributed? 
7. How were the benefits and burdens distributed along the entire journey?

This is essentially how we started, by choosing apparel as our launchpad into more circular thinking. These questions led to some troubling answers and interesting solutions:

• Problem: The apparel industry is a greenhouse gas-intensive industry, with estimated emissions ranging from 2-7% of total global emissions. 
• Solution: Extending the active life of your garment by 9 months can reduce its impact on the environment by 20-30%. Keeping our clothes recirculating and out of landfills reduces their environmental footprint even further. 

• Problem: It takes 2,700 liters of water to produce one non-organic cotton shirt, which is enough water for one person to drink for 2 ½ years. 
• Solution: Purchase only organic cotton, and prioritize cotton grown in the United States from traceable sources. 

• Problem: 20% of global industrial water pollution is due to the dyeing and treatment of textiles. This is devastating our environment and posing health hazards to local communities. 
• Solution: Prioritize brands that avoid harmful dyes by upcycling fabric into new garments and using non-toxic and biodegradable dyes.

• Problem: Garment workers, primarily women, in Bangladesh make about $96 per month. The government’s wage board suggested that a garment worker needs 3.5 times that amount in order to live a “decent life with basic facilities.” 
• Solution: Research the brand’s supply chain labor standards. Avoid brands with little or no transparency.

• Problem: A 2018 U.S. Department of Labor report found evidence of forced and child labor in the fashion industry in Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Philippines, Turkey, Vietnam, and other countries. 
• Solution: Research supply chain labor standards of your favorite brands. Avoid those with little or no transparency.

We found our gold standard in Recover Brand. Not only does their technology and business model help us address these problems, but their supply chain is smaller and more transparent than most apparel companies. This means less carbon emissions from transportation, and a better understanding of the environmental and social standards they have in place. Now let’s introduce the tryout tee.

Summary:

• Keeping our clothing in circulation reduces carbon, water, plastic, and waste pollution. Circularity also reduces the demand for virgin materials. This all adds up to less pressure on the natural environment, which is necessary to allow ecosystems to regenerate and function properly.  In the last 50 or so years, we’ve officially exceeded the Earth’s capacity to regenerate and function properly.

Here’s what it looks like:

Here’s why we like the Sport Tee:

• Made from 100% post-consumer PET (i.e. plastic bottles).
• Made at a partner facility in Guatemala. The facility is powered by 100% responsibly-sourced biomass that consists of wood chips, coffee extract, and other materials. These wood chips are collected from the local forestry industry. 
• Lightweight and breathable
• Moisture-wicking
• Durable
• Athletic fit

Here’s why we like recycled PET:

• Compared to virgin polyester, r-PET reduces the embedded energy, carbon, and water footprints of clothing. R-PET yarn uses 94% less water, as compared to oil-based PET fibers. Additionally, the production process requires 60% less energy, along with a reduction of 32% in CO2 emissions. 
• As of 2018, virgin polyester is the most widely used fiber for clothing in the world. It accounts for 52% of global fiber production. Virgin PET is a petroleum-based material, creating demand for fossil fuel extraction, something we have to curtail immediately. 
• Currently, around 70% of PET plastics are sent to landfills or incinerated in the U.S. How we manage (or mismanage) our waste has serious environmental justice implications. Research shows that 79% of solid waste incinerators are located in historically marginalized communities, burdening these communities with higher rates of air and water pollution that lead to adverse health impacts. 
• Plastic that ends up in our natural environment lasts for centuries, breaking down into smaller pieces over time that are often consumed by animals. The scale of impact is staggering: we produce about 300 million tonnes of plastic waste each year, which is about the weight of the nearly 8 billion humans on the planet. About 8 million tonnes of that plastic waste ends up in our oceans each year. If this trend continues scientists expect we’ll have more plastic than fish in the ocean by 2050.