Greener Tournaments

Cross posted from A2Ultimate Forum:

Hi all,

Through my ultimate career, I've found most ultimate players to be somewhat socially conscious. In addition, our sport is pretty benign when it comes to its environmental impact. We don't damage the fields as much as many other sports, which means that a somewhat lower amount of fertilizers and water should be required to keep our spaces fit for play.

Where this falls apart a bit, however, is at tournaments, and especially ones where food is served. Take a look around when a tournament day is wrapping up and check out all the garbage generated! This includes cups, plates, wrappers, and of course lots & lots of bottles!

I'd like to start moving our Ann Arbor Ultimate sponsored tournaments (like the upcoming end of summer league tournament) to be more environmentally friendly. These are just suggestions of what everyone can do to minimize the environmental impact of tournaments. Eventually, perhaps we can make them the rules:
1 - Bring a reusable water bottle or two. This reduces the need of getting many small water (or Gatorade) bottles & they can be used at the picnic for pop (assuming there are 2 liter bottles) or beer (assuming there's a keg). Plastic bottles are petroleum-based and while they can be recycled (although they are often thrown away at tournaments because there are no available containers for plastic recycling) I don't believe they can be made into new bottles. I'm not an expert, but I don't believe plastic can be used over and over again like glass.
2 - Bring an extra frisbee. Why? Frisbees make great picnic plates! They are much sturdier than paper plates and the lip helps prevent spills. If you have camping silverware, bring that along, too.
3 - Bring an old t-shirt to use as a napkin. Heck, you're going to do laundry after the tournament anyway. Just throw in the extra shirt.
4 - Bring big bags of food (trail mix, fruit, carrots, etc.) for the team to share during the games. This reduces the need for everyone to bring their own small bags which reduces overall wasted packaging.Any other thoughts on what we can & should be doing are certainly welcome. Just add your comments below.

Thanks!

Brian