GEO Sustainable Golf Foundation publishes new “outlook paper” on the future of sustainable golf tournaments

GEO Sustainable Golf Foundation recently published  Outlook Paper: Sustainable Golf Events, exploring the future of sustainable golf tournaments, specifically the collaborative and leadership efforts that support them.

GEO Sustainable Golf Foundation is an international not-for-profit based in North Berwick, Scotland, active in more than 75 countries. According to the Foundation, it is dedicated to helping accelerate worldwide sustainability and climate action in and through golf.

This year, all five of Scotland’s “Summer of Golf” venues are recognized as GEO 2 of 6 Certified for their leadership in sustainable golf practices. The courses include:

The Old Course in St Andrews, host of the AIG Women’s British Open conducted in late August;

• Dundonald Links, Irvine, UK
• The Renaissance Club, North Berwick, UK
• Royal Troon Golf Club, Troon, UK
• Carnoustie Golf Links, Carnoustie, UK

A sixth Scottish event, the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, will take place in Scotland on Oct. 3-6 and will be played entirely over GEO Certified courses, including Kingsbarns GC in St Andrews, Carnoustie and The Old Course.

GEO has worked closely with the tournament owners in recent years behind all six events: the DP World Tour, R&A, LPGA Tour, Ladies European Tour and PGA Tour. The Foundation has also partnered with the government and dozens of local stakeholders to support sustainability strategy and delivery of these tournament assets and community assets.

“Collaboration is essential to the approach,” said Jonathan Smith, founder and executive director of the Foundation. “Indeed, this outlook paper relied on the hands-on experience and diverse input from a range of key stakeholders. The goal in sharing findings — in exploring future challenges and opportunities — is to help elevate the understanding and ambitions of golf and wider event organizers in Scotland and around the golfing world. While golf is the lens, we hope the learnings can help accelerate collaboration, innovations and positive impacts across the broader events sector.”

Founded more than 18 years ago, GEO Sustainable Golf Foundation is dedicated to helping golf across the amateur and professional game, providing strategy, industry-wide solutions and a credible certification label. The Foundation is dedicated to a comprehensive, innovative approach to sustainability via bespoke platforms available to golf facilities and associations, new developments and renovations, tours and competitions and even professional players as individuals.

“Put simply, it’s a broad-ranging exercise in maximizing the positives and minimizing the negatives — involving multiple issues and multiple stakeholders,” said Alan Grant, GEO Foundation’s director of partnerships and engagement.

In and around Scotland, the home of golf, the Scottish government has been influential in sustainability. A refreshed National Events Strategy, Scotland The Perfect Stage 2024-2035, has been built around the premise that a thriving events sector can and should support the delivery of a fairer, greener and wealthier Scotland.

The Foundation aims to inspire, guide and celebrate sustainable practices that positively impact three primary areas: nature, climate and the local community. Accordingly, GEO has partnered with the DP World Tour for several years. Over recent years, The Genesis Scottish Open has met many of its goals regarding resource consumption, diverts 100 percent of waste from landfills and 2023 removed all single-use plastics in site-wide catering.

“One of the biggest sustainability challenges for any event is carbon emissions, 4 of 6 stemming primarily from spectator, organizer and player travel to and from the venue,” Smith said. “Alongside some other areas of resource and materials consumption, these are arguably the largest negative impacts arising from temporary events. They are challenges that require a long-term, multi-stakeholder approach to address — challenges that we all must rise to meet. Sustainability and best practices never really stop. We never dust ourselves off and say, ‘Well, that’s over with.’

“At the same time, there are so many positive impacts that can help events to grow. Such as raising widespread fan awareness, influencing behavior-change on the community level, fundraising for important social and environmental causes, identifying catalysts for green infrastructure investments … That’s why GEO, working with such a great community of partners, creates such detailed frameworks for leadership and collaboration going forward. The outlook paper is an example of this approach. After all, golf is played in a natural setting, in communities. And this has been true for centuries. These are organic advantages that golf can use to be a leader in sustainable events and sports.”

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