Last weekend, the EKOenergy team spent a cold Saturday chatting with hockey fans about renewable energy at the annual Save Pond Hockey tournament in Helsinki. This tournament, along with many others taking place around Finland, was organised by hockey enthusiasts to raise money and awareness for campaigns against climate change.
It’s not hard to see why pond hockey fans would be worried about the climate. The sport takes place on natural frozen lakes, relying on temperatures cold and consistent enough to provide a thick layer of ice. In Helsinki, you often hear people complaining of the decline in snow and ice each year, and this is not just small talk. According to studies from the Finnish Meteorological Institute, winters are not only becoming milder due to climate change, but risk becoming darker and rainier too. This wouldn’t be much fun for any of us, but for pond hockey, it could mean being wiped out for good.
With such gloomy predictions, it would be easy to feel hopeless and uninspired to take action. Often when speaking of climate change, we focus on the negative impacts that we want to avoid, rather than the things we want to protect. This is definitely not the case for Save Pond Hockey! The atmosphere was more one of having a laugh with friends than of serious rivalry, and the games are based on sportsmanship – “no referees needed”. It was refreshing to meet such a cheerful and energetic network of hockey players, brought together by protecting and celebrating a Finnish tradition.
Besides raising money, Save Pond Hockey encourage their supporters to take action in their own lives, and one of their suggested ways to reduce your carbon footprint is to switch to EKOenergy. Our team were pleasantly surprised to find that many of the players who we spoke to were already using EKOenergy in their own homes! Of course, the impacts of climate change go far beyond hockey, but it goes to show that mobilising a community around something they care about really does work.
EKOenergy too aims to fight climate change through positivity. We are against the burning of fossil fuels, but we focus instead on promoting a positive vision of the future: a world powered by 100% renewables. With our Climate and Environment funds, we aim to empower communities in the Global South and to provide better protection for biodiversity. Climate change is a huge threat, but it also gives an opportunity to build a fairer world for people and the environment.
If climate change seems abstract and far away, it’s always worth thinking about how it will affect your everyday life, whether you’re a skier, a scuba diver, a hiker, a travel enthusiast… Like Save Pond Hockey, you can mobilise your community around protecting the things you care about. Or, if you live in Finland, consider getting a team together for one of the upcoming pond hockey tournaments in Tampere, Mikkeli or Oulu!
And of course, wherever you live, if you want to switch to renewable energy, the EKOenergy team is happy to help.
Author: Fran Mills, EKOenergy
Posted on 15 February 2018