When we think of the Super Bowl – America’s most popular sporting event, according to Arcadia Publishing – ocean conservation and military veterans aren’t usually the first of our minds. But for the past two years, a unique collaboration ahead of the annual competition has put coral restoration at the forefront of the world.
For nearly 30 years, NFL Green, the NFL’s environmental and sustainability program, has run community greening initiatives for the sports league. Each season, these culminate in the “Green Week” leading up to the big event, with NFL and Super Bowl Host Committee projects benefiting every host community, explains NFL Green Associate Director Susan Groh.
“NFL Green’s goal is to reduce the environmental impact of our events and go much further to leave a positive green legacy,” Groh told EcoWatch. The efforts include food recovery, recycling and waste management, donating used event and building materials, and offsetting energy for events.
This green legacy has also added a touch of blue over the past two years, meaning conservation efforts focused on the waters of host cities Miami in 2020 and now Tampa in 2021. Miami Green Week activities for Super Bowl LIV include planting 100 endangered staghorn corals in Biscayne Bay in honor of the NFL’s 100th season, Groh said.
Over the past year, the effort has expanded to “100 Yards of Hope,” a football field-sized coral restoration project. The end zones and center of the field-sized reef were placed in the fall of 2020, followed by divers planting thousands of staghorn and mountainous star corals from The Florida Aquarium (FLAQ), University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS) , SECORE International and Frost Science, explained Debborah Luke, FLAQ Senior Vice President Conservation.
Military veterans and coral scientists are teaming up to plant endangered corals as part of the NFL’s 100 Yards of Hope. Force blue
“This all-important project is helping to restore Florida’s coral reef, the world’s third largest barrier reef, which is in crisis,” Luke told EcoWatch.
Florida’s coral reef provides important nurseries that support the oceanic ecosystem and protect the coastlines from storms and erosion, Luke said. It also provides significant economic benefits by pumping $ 3.4 billion into the U.S. economy annually through jobs, tourism, seafood, and medicine, NFL’s Groh added.
Unfortunately, global factors such as the climate crisis, ocean warming and acidification remain threats, along with regional pollutants and a mysterious coral disease.
“More than 90 percent of it [the reef’s] corals have died … restoration of the Florida coral reef is necessary if we are to continue harvesting [its] benefits, ”Luke said.
100 Yards of Hope intends to reverse this trajectory on a single showcase reef, explains Dalton Hesley, a senior research associate at RSMAS whose team spearheaded the restoration efforts. This is the first large-scale restoration project to combine thousands of multi-species sexual and asexual coral transplants with disease detection and mitigation, hedgehog relocation, and high-resolution mapping. These actions all increase coral cover, diversity and recovery, Hesley noted.
“100 Yards of Hope is a symbol. It’s a symbol of what passionate, hopeful individuals can achieve when they work towards a shared vision,” Hesley told EcoWatch. “What began as a celebration of the NFL’s 100th Season has turned into a battle for the future of our coral reef.”
Last week, 150 Elkhorn corals, another endangered coral species, were added to the field. RSMAS delivered 55 of the endangered corals in honor of Super Bowl 55 last weekend. FLAQ provided the remaining corals. A final planting of massive brain and star corals in the spring will complete 100 Yards of Hope, Groh said.
Force Blue military veterans assisted with the plantings. The nonprofit trains and deploys former special operations veterans and military-trained combat divers to work with scientists and environmentalists to conserve the sea, Executive Director Jim Ritterhoff explains.
55 divers remove debris from Tampa Bay as part of the NFL’s Green Week. Force blue
“If we can do something good for veterans by giving them a new mission to save the planet and provide a highly skilled workforce to the scientific community, all the better,” said Ritterhoff. “But maybe the [touchdown] of all this is how this effort is using Navy SEALS and the NFL, people you don’t traditionally see talking about conservation, to reach an audience that wouldn’t necessarily pay attention to coral reef scientists. People listen because these guys are their heroes. “
Ritterhoff noted that this is more of a global project than a local Florida project, adding, “I think it is imperative that everyone is aware of these issues. The Florida coral reef is a national treasure, and it can be disappeared 100 percent during our lifetime. If we don’t behave differently, it’s gone. “
NFL Green Week included the planting of Reed Park’s community garden in Tampa Bay. Michael Farrant / Tampa Bay Super Bowl LV Guest Committee
In addition to coral restoration efforts, NFL Green completed traditional community greening projects. These include creating pollinator gardens, planting mangroves, restoring the coastline and adding sand dunes to prevent erosion and storm damage.
NFL Green also connected land and sea with an underwater cleanup called Dive 55 at the mouth of Tampa Bay. For this, Force Blue team leaders led 55 divers to retrieve more than 1.5 tons of waste, not limited to old fish traps, rope, nets, plastic and beach waste, Groh said. Some of the recovered items will be used by local students to create art projects that will be shown at FLAQ to raise awareness of marine debris.
“It’s all about leadership and legacy,” said Groh. “Major events have the opportunity to not only offset the environmental impact of their events, but also to go much further and leave the communities that organize events better than they found them. The world faces significant environmental challenges and we’ll all have to deal with them. “
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