Athletes’ concerns could undermine Paris 2024’s climate-friendly ambitions for the Olympics

According to the organisers, this summer’s Olympics, due to kick off in Paris later this month, will be the “greenest ever games”.

There’s a raft of initiatives on display in pursuit of this goal, but one of them is at risk of being undermined by several national Olympic teams.

Teams from Australia, Canada, Denmark, Italy, the UK and the US, among others, are complaining about the lack of traditional air-conditioning (AC) units in the athlete’s accommodation — in recognition of the significant impact AC units have on increasing energy demand and emissions of climate pollutant refrigerant gases, the Paris 2024 organisers have opted for a range of different cooling technologies.

The building’s architecture ensures the apartments are not exposed to the full force of the sun, super-efficient insulation has been installed and a geothermal cooling system will use the natural cooling of the earth to bring temperatures down in the apartments.

Residential AC in Paris is relatively rare and the accommodation will be used by regular Parisians after the games.

However, the teams claim the apartments will not be cool enough to ensure peak athletic performance and therefore plan to bring their own portable AC units – which are often even more energy inefficient than regular fixed units. Average Paris temperatures in July and August are about 25°C and tests have shown the accommodation can stay reliably 6°C cooler than outside temperatures.

HFC refrigerant (c) EIA

The Paris organisers have now pledged to provide the option to hire AC units, at the teams’ own expense, if they feel they’re required, but have asked them to give the accommodation a chance first.

Responding to these announcements, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo urged teams to “trust the science” and added: “I have a lot of respect for the comfort of the athletes, but I’m thinking even more about the survival of humanity.”

This debate reveals how ingrained traditional AC has become to our idea of cooling. Some national teams involved cannot imagine a cool apartment without AC units and are seemingly ignoring the Olympic organiser’s solutions.

While energy-associated emissions from AC are well documented, the use of climate-wrecking F-gas refrigerants in cooling equipment cannot be ignored. These have been shown to contribute to more than one-third of emissions from cooling products — and their emissions are on the rise.

“We need to shift our perspectives and embrace climate-friendly, sustainable cooling options. If we do not, we will end up in a heating-cooling loop where, faced with warmer temperatures driven by climate change, more air-conditioning is used, which causes further temperature increase,” said EIA Climate Campaigner Adam Aucock.

There are also clear parallels forming between this situation and the wider inequality in cooling globally. The list of countries which have pledged to shirk the environmental schemes and bring their own portable AC units predominantly comprises of wealthy, Global North countries. Across the world the places predicted to suffer the most from heatwaves are also those where people lack access to cooling.

Portable AC units work by taking heat from one place and dispersing it to another. In this case, they will take it from the rooms of athletes from economically richer countries and pump it into the air surrounding the accommodation for those unable to afford such units.

“We expect countries to support the efforts of the host country to minimise greenhouse gas emissions,” concluded Aucock. “Teams should trust in the cooling solutions provided and embrace the spirit of the games, where anyone from any country should be able to come and compete on a level playing field.”