NHL Goes Green

NHL players team up with David Suzuki Foundation

Canadian Press

The Boston Bruins' Andrew Ference is very happy to see so many NHL players showing support for the David Suzuki Foundation.

TORONTO - Everybody seems to be going green these days and the NHL Players' Association is asking its members to jump on the bandwagon.

The David Suzuki Foundation and the union announced plans Friday for a partnership that asks players to become more eco-friendly, both at home through their personal choices and in their professional lives through the NHLPA Carbon Neutral Challenge.

The latter initiative involves players purchasing clean-air credits to compensate for the extra carbon produced by their extensive travels - a concept known as carbon offsets. All the money they raise will help fund three clean-air projects around the world through Montreal-based not-for-profit Planetair.

"It's unbelievable how guys pick up on it and know something is important," said Boston Bruins defenceman Andrew Ference, the catalyst for the program. "Hockey is filled with a lot of great character and guys are showing it by stepping up and doing the right thing.

"It's all about taking initiative and we have a lot of guys who are really good at doing that."

Over 350 players - including everyone on the Florida Panthers and Dallas Stars - have already signed up to contribute $290 annually and hundreds more are expected to join in the coming weeks. The amount is based on a clean-air credit cost of $29 per ton and research that says each NHL player contributes 10 tons of carbon emissions per season.

While the dollar-amount may be small, the world-renowned Suzuki believes the impact of having hockey players involved is immeasurable.

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"It's introducing guys to things they might not have known about," said Ference. "In Calgary for example, it was call the power companies and switch to wind and guys were like, 'Oh, you can do that?' Six or seven guys picked up the phone and switched to wind. People in general want to do the right thing, as long as someone can show them the way, they're all for it.

"Hockey players aren't different than anybody else."

Their contributions to the carbon challenge will go towards a bio-mass outfit in India, a micro-hydro system in Indonesia and a wind-farm in Madagascar.