Do the Olympics impact CO2 emissions? A cross-national analysis

Abstract

In recent decades scholars and practitioners have grown concerned about the sustainability of mega sporting events, such as the Olympics. While there has been much debate concerning the carbon footprint of the Olympics, and attempts to manage CO2 emissions of the event in the future, there is little empirical research to our knowledge that puts the Olympics events in a cross-national context, which would enable us to assess how the Olympics, over time and compared to other countries, has impacted CO2 emissions cross-nationally, rather than as an isolated event. This is important because emissions from the Olympics are not just bound to the hosting nation but are more diffuse given the level of travel and trade customary to the event. Moreover, a cross-national quantitative approach can help us understand the overall impact of hosting the Olympics on CO2 emissions, which may provide a larger and longer perspective from which to critique and amend guidelines and principles surrounding such events. To do so, we use two-way fixed effects regression analysis for a sample of 131 nations from 1991 to 2019 to assess how the Olympics impacts CO2 emissions cross-nationally. We find that both in the two years preceding an Olympics event and in the year of the event CO2 emissions of the hosting nation are significantly increased, even while controlling for relevant factors such as GDP, population, trade, agriculture, and manufacturing. This impact is consistent across countries and across time. However, we also find that CO2 emissions do not remain increased once the event is finished. Our analysis shows that emissions in a nation return to pre-Olympics levels in the year following the event.