Sustainable Luxury, Beauty & Sport

The CBC reports Vancouver 2010 is looking to spectators travelling to the Olympic Winter Games to help with carbon offsets for the estimated 268,000 tons of emissions the Games will be responsible for.

Spectators travelling to Vancouver to attend the Winter Games will be responsible for almost half of the carbon footprint, 130,000 tons, and organizers say they would encourage Games tourists to buy carbon offsets to balance the environmental impact of their travel.

VANOC corporate sustainability officer Ann Duffy said, « because of the nature of individuals taking responsibility for where they want to travel, we’re trying to make it easy », reports the CBC. Duffy said the hope is that « people include this in some of their decisions to travel and enjoy the Games ».

Tourists are directed to a VANOC-sanctioned website called offsetters.ca, as one place where they could calculate and pay for their carbon offsets. The website acts as a brokerage, connecting individuals and corporations to offset projects to which they can contribute, reports the CBC.

Vancouver 2010 organizers said they would only take responsibility for offsetting the estimated 118,000 tons of direct emissions from the Games that have been generated by venue construction and athletes’ travel. Duffy said, « one has to draw the line somewhere. We’re doing some heavy lifting in terms of covering the footprint for our direct operations ».According to the CBC, VANOC anticipates that sponsors and governments will pick up the offset costs for the estimated 20,000 tons of carbon emissions not paid for by organizers and Games’ tourists.

It is clear that BaselWorld, SIHH, GTE or other Luxury Events have nothing to compare with the Olympic Game in terms of carbon footprint. But…., they should take the lead in planning, organising and staging sustainable and responsible luxury and use it as a platform to raise the awareness among the entire Luxury Community. Why not ? How to start … More News.

This is a major event and everybody knows that, 2010 Winter Olympic Games are coming, and they will be hosted in Vancouver and Whistler, Canada. Always in USA’s shadow, Canada’s mining industry is the third leader in the extraction of gold. Well, what’s the link between Canadian’s mining industry and the Vancouver Olympic Games?

This link is simple: the medals. As the host country, Canada will design and produce the 615 Olympic and the 399 Paralympics gold, silver and bronze medals. It represents 2.05 kg of 99.99% pure gold, approximately 1,950kg of pure silver and 903 kg of copper. The medals will be among the heaviest ones in Olympic and Paralympics history, with an average weight of 550g each.

The task of producing them was given to the Royal Canadian Mint and to Teck Resources Limited (which is headquarted in Vancouver).  The first will be in charge of the design and conception (each medal will be a one-of-a-kind masterpiece) and the latter will have to furnish the materials. The Teck company is Canada’s largest diversified mining, mineral processing and metallurgical company.

Going along with the sustainability turns taken by the Olympics Games, this company advocates sustainable and responsible practices in its businesses. She owes or has interests 13 mines in Canada, in the USA, in Chile and in Peru, which are managed through a Code of Ethics and a Code of Sustainable Conducts. The Company has engaged in responsible practices toward main stakeholders (employees, communities and shareholders) and holds considerations for the populations of the countries she works in, investing in the local communities, hiring and training local workers.

A new process has been used to build the Olympic and Paralympics medals: the E-waste process. Teck is a primary recycler for the Encorp Return-ItTM Electronics program in British Columbia. By recycling end-of-life-electronic (EOLE) equipment, the company extracts a certain percentage of metals that were used in the production of the medals.

Medals are a kind of luxury goods. Luxury brands should learn and consider the actual expectations of consumers and the benefits their companies will gain in terms of innovation, competition and productivity. Mining is the base of the luxury industry and one of the most attacked industry regarding damages toward the environment and the local communities. Mindsets are changing within the luxury industry. It is time for corporate practices to start moving forward too.