West Ham United women’s stars Lucy Parker and Mel Filis joined young pupils at a school in Essex to focus on sustainability and tackling climate change as part of Green Football Weekend.
Taking place between 3-5 February, Green Football Weekend encourages WSL, Premier League and EFL clubs to take part in Planet League’s Green Football Cup – a competition to complete green activities to help our planet and score points for your club.
The West Ham United Foundation are supporting local schools to get involved in the Green Football Cup, with Parker and Filis interacting with pupils at Quilters Junior School in Billericay to talk about the importance of protecting the environment and being more sustainable.
The visit saw the two players take part in a special question and answer session with the pupils before they participated in Planet League’s ‘Layer Up’ challenge in the classroom. Both players then accompanied the students to the playground to pick up litter.
Speaking to Sky Sports’ Lynsey Hooper at the school Parker, who attended the visit in eco-friendly trainers made from recyclable materials, said: “Football is a massive platform for change and at this moment in time, climate change is at the forefront of everyone’s mind.
“For West Ham as a club to try and promote the message that we need to look after our planet is a really important thing.
“It was great to be here with the young pupils today to focus on this area. Their knowledge was good, and I was really impressed with some of their great questions.”
Filis added: “When we went out into the playground, you could see how enthusiastic they were about tidying up and picking up any litter that they found, which is fantastic.
“Our focus has been to help them remain enthusiastic to continue to do the right things where possible and encouraging them to educate those around them like parents and careers to do the same thing, so that we can all work together.
“Going forwards, they have said they are going to try and keep the environment cleaner so hopefully this has been a really positive visit for them.”
West Ham United works with London Stadium to ensure that the Club has a home ground that is a true leader when it comes to sustainability.
In its clean energy drive, the Stadium’s electricity is supplied from 100% renewable sources, with a new workforce entrance building set to include 150 sqm of Solar panels.
The Stadium now has LED floodlights, reducing the carbon footprint since August 2021, and holds an excellent BREEAM standard. It is also promoted as a public transport venue (less than one in eight people or 12% travel by car to watch matches) with all plastic straws, stirrers and plastic cutlery removed by caterers from their operation.
Ninety five per cent of the Stadium's urinals are waterless, sinks have either sensor activated taps or percussion cap taps and the majority of taps are fitted with water saving devices.
More widely across the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, promoting biodiversity and conservation in urban spaces has been a key part of the transformation of the area, with the Park recently receiving the Green Flag Award for the eighth year in a row.