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The Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas (Nevada) will make history next week as the first National Football League (NFL) stadium in the United States powered entirely by renewable energy to host the Super Bowl. It reaches 100% use of renewable energy with 10 MW of external solar energy, along with wind, geothermal and hydroelectric resources.
Super Bowl LVIII, the final game of the National Football League championship, will pit the Kansas City Chiefs against the San Francisco 49ers in Las Vegas, Nevada, next Sunday, February 11. It will be the first Super Bowl to be held at Allegiant Stadium, home of the Raiders, which runs on 100% renewable energy.
A 100% renewable sports stadium is no easy task. During a game, an NFL sports stadium can consume up to 10 MW of energy for five hours, or 50 MWh. The electric company NV Energy told a CBS journalist that 10 MW is approximately equivalent to the consumption of 46,000 homes.
Allegiant Stadium is taking a global approach to achieving its sustainability and renewable energy goals. Solar power is the dominant renewable energy source for the Las Vegas Raiders stadium, whose organization in 2019 signed a 25-year power supply agreement with NV Energy to purchase generation from an off-site solar array managed by the public service company.
The stadium is subscribed to part of a massive 621,000 solar panel system that also has supply contracts with some of the resorts on the Las Vegas strip.
The solar power supply agreement consists of two phases: the facility purchases power on the wholesale market and excess capacity is purchased from NV Energys existing fleet of power plants. Starting in the second half of 2023, new off-site renewable energy and energy storage facilities will begin commercial operation, and the stadium will be supplied with energy from these new sites.
The $1.9 billion state-of-the-art stadium has adopted numerous other energy efficiency and emissions reduction measures. The building is LEED Gold certified, and is also supplied with electricity from hydroelectric dams, geothermal energy and wind energy.
Other sustainability measures by the Raiders and Allegiant Stadium are:
Waste Diversion – The stadium diverts waste from the landfill and currently reuses, repurposes or donates 20 material streams.
Food waste collection – On average, more than 5,400 kg of kitchen trimmings and food waste are collected at the end of each major stadium event.
Cigarette Waste Collection – Allegiant Stadium is the first stadium in the US to divert cigarette waste from the landfill and convert it into energy. This program has generated more than 69,000 W of energy.
Raiders Field Grass Trimmings – The field has a rail system that allows grass to be moved outside to grow in natural sunlight, instead of using energy-intensive indoor grow lights. The stadium diverts grass clippings to the on-site biomass machine. To date, almost 73,000 kg of grass clippings have been composted or diverted.
“Our mission has been and will continue to be to develop and improve sustainable policies that reduce our environmental footprint while bringing world-class concerts, sporting events and corporate events to Las Vegas,” said Chris Wright, general manager of Allegiant Stadium. |
