Web Communications of Environmental Sustainability Initiatives at Sport Facilities Hosting Major League Soccer

Abstract

We are living in times of tremendous ecological change (Winn & Kirchgeorg, 2005). In response, the United Nations (UN) promotes a movement towards safeguarding the natural environment or environmental sustainability (ES). Sport has not been immune from the challenges of ES and, thus, the guiding research question of the current investigation was: How does sport communicate its participation in environmental sustainability (ES)? To answer this research question this study focused on sport facilities that were home to a professional Major League Soccer (MLS) franchise during 2011; specifically, the analysis focused on the facilities’ website communications on ES. This investigation utilized a content analysis process for data collection that involved four steps framed with an adaptation of the design by Krippendorff (1980) and Weber (1985). Data analysis was framed with the principles of environmental performance by Glavi? and Lukman (2007) as well as ES components by Mallen and Chard (2012). The results showed that sport facilities communicated a pattern towards some ES action; specifically, renewable resource use, resource minimization, and recycling were communicated as the key areas of focus for sustainability.