Milano Cortina 2026: how sustainable are the Winter Games?

The Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics are unfolding against a backdrop of competing sustainability claims. On one side, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is positioning the Games as a model of responsible delivery, highlighting high venue reuse rates, renewable energy sourcing and local economic impact. On the other, a coordinated wave of athlete advocacy and NGO pressure is demanding structural commitments—most notably a ban on fossil fuel sponsorship—that the Olympic movement has so far declined to adopt.

The result is a live debate about what sustainable Games delivery should mean, playing out in real time during the event itself.

The IOC’s sustainability case

The official sustainability narrative for Milano Cortina 2026 centers on infrastructure restraint. According to the IOC, 85 percent of competition venues are existing or temporary structures – among the highest reuse rates in Winter Games history. Almost all facilities are powered by certified renewable electricity, with the limited use of temporary generators running primarily on HVO (hydrotreated vegetable oil), a renewable biofuel alternative to diesel.

The Cortina Curling Olympic Stadium serves as the IOC’s flagship example. Originally built for the Cortina 1956 Winter Olympics, the venue was retrofitted rather than rebuilt – new roof insulation, a dehumidification system reducing energy consumption, three additional lifts and roughly 80 accessible seats added across all levels. Prince Albert II of Monaco, IOC Member and Chair of the IOC Sustainability and Legacy Commission, visited the site during the second week of competition and called the approach “a model for future Olympic Games.”

Beyond operations, the IOC has also highlighted the economic footprint of the Games. According to research from Bocconi and Ca’ Foscari Universities, the event is projected to generate over €5 billion in net economic impact for Italy and create 36,000 jobs. A social procurement program called Impact 2026, developed with the Yunus Sports Hub and Fondazione Giacomo Brodolini, has directed more than €1.77 million in contracts to local micro-enterprises and social businesses, with over 400 firms trained in sustainable procurement practices.

What athletes are asking for instead

The athlete community is pressing on a different front. On February 9, an open letter was published at forfuturegames.com  and signed by 88 Olympians and 53 additional elite athletes. The letter calls on the IOC to ban fossil fuel companies from Olympic sponsorship, drawing an explicit parallel with the tobacco ban introduced following the 1988 Calgary Games. The Italian energy giant Eni serves as a Premium Partner of Milano Cortina 2026, alongside the global automotive group Stellantis and ITA Airways, the national carrier controlled by Lufthansa.

“We believe it is a contradiction to celebrate human achievement while being funded by the industry that threatens the fundamental conditions, from reliable snow to safe temperatures, upon which all Olympic sports depend,” the letter states.

The signatories span a wide range of disciplines and nationalities, including multiple gold medalists from Australia, Canada, the US, Sweden and Great Britain. They are calling for four specific actions: formal dialogue with an athlete delegation at the IOC Sustainability and Legacy Commission; science-grounded decision-making on sponsorship policy; a formal exclusion of fossil fuel companies from IOC sponsor eligibility; and explicit integration of this position into the IOC’s Fit for the Future strategic framework.

The letter builds on earlier athlete advocacy. In March 2025, 450 Olympians from more than 90 countries wrote asking that planetary protection become the organisation’s “absolute priority,” including action on high-polluting sponsorships. That 2025 campaign was highly strategic: it targeted the IOC Presidential election. Kirsty Coventry, who won the election in a landslide on 20 March 2025, responded directly to the letter during her campaign, saying she was inspired by the collective advocacy of so many Olympians on climate change and that, if entrusted with the role, she would make it a priority.

Protect Our Winters UK points to structural gaps

Protect Our Winters UK (POW UK), the climate advocacy network for the outdoor sports community, issued its own statement on February 11, drawing on the Games to highlight what it describes as structural shortcomings that go beyond venue-level sustainability choices.

The group’s critique focuses on three areas. First, the ongoing use of artificial snowmaking – a resource-intensive process that POW UK argues is unsustainable as Alpine warming accelerates. Second, the scale and environmental impact of transport infrastructure investment. Third, governance transparency: POW UK states that 60 percent of Milano-Cortina infrastructure projects went ahead without prior environmental review, and that infrastructure plans were only made public following external pressure.

This third point sits in some tension with the IOC’s narrative around Impact 2026 and community-centered planning. The IOC frames the program as evidence of local inclusion; POW UK argues that Alpine communities were largely bypassed in key decision-making, with choices made centrally.

New research cited by POW UK, led by climate scientist Dr. Daniel Scott and co-authored with Dr. Robert Steiger of the University of Innsbruck and Dr. Maddy Orr of the University of Toronto, projects that by 2050, fewer than half of past Winter Olympic host cities will have sufficient natural snow conditions to stage the Games under current emissions trajectories.

The SGIE take

This is not a binary argument between progress and protest. The three positions—IOC operational progress, athlete sponsorship reform demand, and POW UK structural critique—are not mutually exclusive. They address different timescales and decision-makers.

The IOC is delivering measurable improvements within a legacy infrastructure model. Athletes are deploying targeted governance pressure at leadership transition moments. Advocacy groups are building participatory planning frameworks for future host cities.

Each intervention targets a different point in the decision architecture. The question is whether that architecture itself—the IOC’s governance model, its revenue dependencies, its relationship to member federations and host nations—can synthesise these pressures into coherent, binding policy.

For sporting goods brands, the conversation about Olympic sustainability is increasingly about the future of the winter sports market itself. The research that informs athlete advocacy also shapes long-term scenarios for snowsport participation, resort viability and the Alpine consumer base. How the IOC responds—on fossil fuel sponsorship, on community governance, on snowmaking reliance—will have downstream implications for a market whose premium winter segment depends on the health of mountain environments and the credibility of the events staged within them.