Premier League clubs have come under fire this season for their use of domestic flights, which have been criticised for their impact on the environment. To measure the clubs’ climate credentials, Sport Positive and BBC Sport have produced an annual table ranking all 20 Premier League clubs based on their environmental efforts. For the fourth consecutive season, the results are in, with Tottenham and Liverpool coming joint top for the second year running. Spurs are the only club providing classroom education sessions on environmental sustainability for their men’s and women’s first team squads. All teams lost points for taking domestic flights – a new scoring element this season – and four clubs report all their emissions publicly: Liverpool, Spurs, Manchester City and Wolves. Seven clubs have net-zero targets, including Arsenal, Newcastle and Southampton. Forest Green, who topped the EFL sustainability table, would have scored 26 in the Premier League rankings had they not taken any domestic flights.
Club ownership and sponsorship is an area that has not yet been added to the scoring matrix, but Sport Positive CEO Claire Poole said that “organisations a football club aligns itself with” are “part of the bigger picture when it comes to sustainability”. Poole added that while there are few fossil fuel companies among the 350 sponsors of the current Premier League teams, some of them can be viewed as having an adverse effect on our planet or our society in some way. In a statement to BBC Sport, the Premier League re-iterated it “is in the process of developing an environmental sustainability strategy, which will set out plans to deliver climate action”.