Friday 12 February 2021

Low carbon wooden stadium approved by English Football League

The English Football League has approved the construction of an all-timber football stadium to become the new home of League Two side, Forest Green Rovers.

The 5,000-capacity venue will be designed by Zaha Hadid Architects and aims to be carbon-neutral.

The stadium will become the first professional all-wood football stadium and will be built entirely from sustainably-sourced timber. Zaha Hadid has stated laminated timber is a highly durable, safe and recyclable material.

It will become the centrepiece of a £100 million 'Eco Park' development, which includes Ecotricity’s proposed 100-acre sports and green technology business park in Gloucestershire.

In conversation with Sky Sports TV, Dale Vince, Forest Green Rovers Chairman, said: “From an environment point of view, 75% of the carbon footprint of all stadia in their entire lifetime comes from the materials they’re made from.

“It’s not about the energy used to run them, it’s embedded on day one. We’ll have the lowest carbon footprint of any stadium anywhere in the world since the Romans invented concrete”.