By Alizée Pillod, Université de Montréal
Italy is preparing to host the 25th Winter Olympic Games next month — from Feb. 6 to the 22nd, followed by the Paralympic Games from March 6 to the 15th.
After the excitement of the Paris Summer Games in 2024, which had sustainability at the heart of its planning strategy, the Milan Winter Games will be decisive in determining whether there’s truly a major shift happening within the Olympic movement.
Will the organizing committee be able to keep its green promises?
As a doctoral student in political science at the University of Montréal, my work focuses on both climate communication and environmental policy development, including in the sports sector.
Winter Games in the Climate Era
It should be noted that few sectors are as dependent on weather conditions as outdoor sports.
The climate crisis is making it increasingly difficult to practise sports, especially winter sports. The cancellation of the Alpine Ski World Cup in Mont Tremblant last year due to lack of snow is just one striking example of what’s happening.
According to a study by the University of Waterloo, only 10 former Olympic sites will remain viable for hosting future Winter Games by the year 2050. By 2080, that number could drop to just six.
At the same time, hosting mega sporting events such as the Olympics generates a considerable carbon and environmental footprint.
Although generally smaller than the Summer Games, the Winter Games have been the subject of many environmental controversies, particularly in relation to the destruction of preserved nature reserves.
For the most recent Games in Beijing in 2022, more than 20,000 ancient trees were felled to make room for an expanded ski area and the construction of infrastructure, including access roads, car parks and lodging facilities.
High-level sport is therefore caught in a conflict of both being affected by and contributing to global warming.
Agendas Set New Standards
In light of these challenges, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has adopted several policies in recent years to reduce the footprint of the Games, such as the Olympic Agenda 2020, with strategic objectives that were reiterated in 2021 with the Olympic Agenda 20+5.
After Paris 2024, the Milan-Cortina Games will be the first Winter Games to have to comply with these requirements.
Two of the goals are to promote sustainable Games and to make the Games a springboard for achieving the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.
To this end, the IOC now requires host cities to reduce their CO₂ emissions and promote the concept of legacy to encourage the reuse or converstion of existing venues when the event is over.
Milan-Cortina on the Green Track
Fortunately, it looks like the Italian organizing committee has decided to make the fight against global warming a central part of its strategic plan. From the outset, it implemented a rigorous process for assessing its greenhouse gas emissions.
In its second report on its sustainability strategy, published in September 2025, the committee also presented several measures to further reduce the carbon footprint of the event.
The flagship initiatives include a commitment to use 100 per cent renewable energy and limit food waste by redistributing any surplus food to local charities. In an effort to encourage the circular economy, more than 20,000 pieces of equipment from the Paris Games were repurchased.
In terms of infrastructure, the focus is once again on reusing existing facilities and using temporary structures that will be dismantled after the Games, as they were in Paris. In total, nearly 90 per cent of the venues will fall into this category.
The few new permanent buildings being built will become training centres for Italy’s future elite athletes, or be converted for other uses. Like the one in Paris, the new Olympic Village in Milan will become a university residence, for example.
The plan also includes adaptation measures. With global warming, natural snowfall is becoming increasingly rare and the use of artificial snow is becoming the new norm to offer athletes optimal performance conditions. The organizing committee has therefore decided to modernize its artificial snow production systems to respond more effectively to needs in the event of abnormally warm temperatures this winter.
An Ambitious Plan, but Not Flawless
While the plan looks reassuring on paper, its implementation still presents a number of challenges.
Beyond the chronic delays in the progress of the work and colossal budget overruns (spending so far is at least double the initial budget), the construction of new infrastructure in the mountains necessarily has a significant environmental footprint.
It’s also worth noting that the Milan-Cortina Games will take place at venues spread across four areas in northern Italy: Milan, Cortina, Valtellina and Val di Fiemme. Together, these venues cover an area of more than 20,000 square kilometres, making these the most widely dispersed Games in history. As a result, there will be not one but six resort sites for athletes.
This undoubtedly explains why most of the budget is allocated to the development of public transport, particularly the rail network, in order to facilitate travel between the various venues. Sports infrastructure, meanwhile, accounts for less than a quarter of the total budget.
In addition, some of the construction projects have been controversial. The brand new bobsled track in Cortina, for example, has been heavily criticized because it required the felling of several hundred trees. Although these numbers are far lower than those in Beijing, the fact remains that hosting the Games leads to the disruption of local biodiversity.
In terms of temporary facilities, the committee has pledged to restore ecosystems and, more broadly, offset all residual emissions, in particular by buying carbon credits. However, pessimists will argue that what has been destroyed can never be fully restored, and that no financial or ecological compensation can truly erase the impact.
In terms of adaptation, it should be noted that the production of artificial snow, even when it’s optimized, uses a lot of water and energy, in addition to degrading soil quality. So this solution, which is supposed to mitigate the effects of global warming, paradoxically ends up contributing to it, highlighting the importance of better thinking about adaptation solutions.
Finally, residents fear gentrification. In Milan, the construction of the Olympic Village led to the eviction of residents, and the rents planned once the site is converted into student accommodation are considered too high. From a social justice perspective, therefore, it’s worth asking who will truly benefit from the new facilities in the longer term.
A Genuine Turning Point?
Overall, the Milan-Cortina strategy shows a real evolution in the way we think about the sustainability of the Winter Games. The organizers have learned from previous Games and are now proposing even more innovative approaches.
Although the anticipated greenhouse gas emissions are lower than in Beijing or in Pyeongchang, those for Milan-Cortina are still estimated at nearly one million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent. In this context, hopefully the committee will succeed in implementing all the measures planned to offset as much as possible.
Furthermore, the next Winter Games will take place in the French Alps. The brand new organizing committee for the 2030 Games is no doubt closely monitoring the choices that were made on the Italian side, aware of the growing climate challenges that await it.
In the meantime, we can count on the athletes and para-athletes, who, as I write these lines, are already hard at work getting ready to dazzle us once again, if only for a moment.
Alizée Pillod, Doctorante en science politique, Université de Montréal
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
