Air Date: Week of October 20, 2000

Living On Earth’s Maggie Villiger reports that the subway series between cross town rival Mets and Yankees has some environmental benefits.

Transcript

VILLIGER: Take me out to the ball game on the Number 7 train, please, and save the environment. Riding the subway cuts down on pollution, and the New York Mets/New York Yankees subway series may make history for doing the same. That's primarily because they won't be spewing pollution into the atmosphere, since they won't be firing up the team jet to reach distant stadiums. Carbon dioxide emissions can be calculated on a per airline passenger mile basis, and that means about 700,000 pounds of CO2 would have been released if, say, the Mets were playing Seattle. That's assuming a 40-man roster. The greenhouse gas savings is even bigger when you include trainers, coaches, managers, the media, and dedicated fans. The savings couldn't come at a better time. Since the last Yankees/Brooklyn Dodger subway series in 1956, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by 19 percent. That's this week's environmental sports update. I'm Maggie Villiger.