Shell Energy Stadium: A more sustainable stadium for the future of sports
The Houston Dynamo and Houston Dash have set ambitious decarbonization targets to reduce the stadium’s carbon footprint by 50% by 2026.
There’s nothing like the buzz of a sell-out stadium packed with fans cheering their team. For the home team, it’s like having an extra player out on the field, pushing them to victory. Just ask the players from the Major League Soccer (MLS) team, the Houston Dynamo, or the National Women’s Soccer League’s (NWSL) Houston Dash.
A lot of hard work goes into creating those heart-pumping gameday experiences – and most of it occurs when the fans aren’t around. This includes efforts to improve the environmental impact of Shell Energy Stadium, the home of the Dynamo and Dash. With the stadium set to welcome huge crowds of international soccer fans in 2026, decarbonization presents an exciting opportunity for the Dynamo and Dash to set an example to the world of sports.
So, how do you make an entire stadium more sustainable? We sat down with Lana Ramirez, Vice President of Operations for Houston Dynamo Football Club, to understand the decarbonization journey at Shell Energy Stadium – and why collaboration with industry experts is vital to its success.
Building a relationship that delivers a sustainable stadium
The Dynamo and Dash have set ambitious decarbonization targets to reduce the stadium’s carbon footprint by 50% by 2026. To deliver on this, they’ve collaborated with Shell Energy to explore opportunities to create more sustainable operations beyond simply looking at the energy they use to power the stadium.
The Dynamo and Dash went into the 2022 season knowing their energy provider’s relationship would be concluding. So, they started a process of analysis, understanding their needs and opportunities to help them select the right energy provider. Since then, Shell Energy has become the official energy provider for the stadium1 and gained the naming rights to Shell Energy Stadium in January 2023.2
It isn’t just about looking at energy supply for the Dynamo and Dash, though. It’s also about exploring their overall decarbonization goals. They need much more than just an energy provider – they need a partner for their community and a partner to help them achieve their sustainability goals.
Collaborating with Shell Energy presents the Dynamo and Dash with an opportunity to power progress. It’s important for them to be an example for others through the power and platform of sports. They view themselves as having a responsibility to lead in decarbonization. So, when those conversations took place with Shell Energy, they were better able to understand the opportunity ahead and their roadmap to it.
Overcoming the unique challenges of a major sports organization
Even before talking to Shell Energy, the Dynamo and Dash had begun their decarbonization journey by switching to LED bulbs for their stadium lights. This was a big step forward and meant they could illuminate the action on the field while reducing their energy consumption and costs. The key to changes like this was to keep thinking ahead about what the stadium’s needs would be in the future.
“The stadium has been open for more than ten years now, and we’re starting to get those growing pains in places,” says Lana Ramirez. “So, we have to reach the decisions that make sense for us in the future. It’s not about doing something for the sake of doing something. It’s about making intentional decisions that take us in the right direction in the long term.”
However, while decarbonization represents a massive opportunity for the Dynamo and Dash to show their leadership in the MLS, NWSL, and beyond, it won’t be an easy journey. Supply chain challenges lingering from pandemic-related material shortages mean delays remain a constant worry for any project. And that’s without working around your high-profile athlete tenants.
“With the MLS, NWSL, and more, we’re pretty busy with roughly 45-50 field events each year,” explains Ramirez. “We only have around three months to get big projects done in the stadium, so we’re finding different ways to achieve our goals. Sometimes that means working with temporary solutions that get us to opening day and then building from there.”
Delivering decarbonization solutions in this setting is a unique challenge for the Shell Energy team, but it’s far from insurmountable. With plans to install further LED lighting, new high-efficiency HVAC systems, onsite solar panels, and electric vehicle (EV) charging stations around the stadium, there’s plenty of room for progress all year round.
Gaining leadership buy-in to drive long-term change
Another vital element in making a facility of this size more sustainable is the need for buy-in from organizational leaders. It’s one of the first key milestones that the Dynamo and Dash reached, highlighting the importance of working with expert partners to get there successfully.
Education was the first step, going back to the purpose of the club and its platform. That meant asking some core questions: ‘What is our mission? What are our values? And what is our responsibility to be an example to the community?’ Getting alignment on these was critical in gaining buy-in. They needed to show everyone in their organization that the journey is about more than dollars and cents.
The next big step was exploring the planning and process of the stadium’s decarbonization. Everyone behind the scenes of the Dynamo and Dash needed to understand their end goal and work backward to create a plan to reach it. That way, they could accelerate their approach to getting buy-in from across the organization.
When the Shell Energy team came in, it helped that the Dynamo and Dash already knew their goal. This made it easier to assess how attainable 50% by 2026 is and where the stadium was in relation to that goal at the beginning of the journey. It all supported their ability to bring individuals and teams from across the Dynamo and Dash business along and make it an organizational process.
The Dynamo and Dash established their goals before learning they would host major international games in 2026. But, with the vast platform that soccer offers likely to accelerate progress in this area, aligning the two highlights the opportunity to set an example for sustainable practices.
Looking ahead to an exciting decarbonization journey
From onsite renewables to energy efficiency to renewable supply options, the Dynamo and Dash on their decarbonization journey. And, with the support of the experts at Shell Energy, have enjoyed a smooth process so far that’s helped to set up a longer-term pathway to sustainability.
And a key learning for the Shell Energy team is just how accurate Ted Lasso is… Don’t walk on the field!