From Mexico to Canada to the US, FIFA president Gianni Infantino is racing from stadium to stadium at this World Cup — and critics say the whirlwind itinerary is turning into a climate flashpoint.
Mexico City, Guadalajara, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Vancouver, Seattle, Kansas City, Houston: the Italo-Swiss chief has already fired up his private jet to take in 10 matches in just seven days.
Infantino’s reliance on a Qatar Airways private aircraft is not a new revelation. In September 2024, investigative outlet Josimar reported that he had used the jet to log 600,000km over the previous three years.
But the expanded 2026 World Cup — the first to feature 48 teams across the United States, Canada, and Mexico, and to swell from 64 to 104 matches — has thrown a harsher spotlight on the environmental cost of that travel style.
“Just one hour in this plane emits roughly what an average human being emits in an entire year,” Greenly, a French company specializing in carbon footprint assessments, said this week.
‘Sustainability paradox’
Greenly estimates that if Infantino keeps linking up two cities per day through the end of the round of 16, then attends the final eight matches, he will produce “a defensible range of 300 to 500 tons of CO2 for his plane alone” across the tournament.
That figure, the firm says, matches “the annual footprint of around 35 to 55 French people”.
Gianni Infantino, Tunisian Football Federation President Moez Nasri and Hisako, Princess Takamado during Group F match between Tunisia and Japan at Monterrey Stadium in Mexico on 20 June
FIFA has defended the travel schedule by arguing that its executives select commercial or private flights “based on what is most efficient and cost-effective” and emphasizing that, in every case, the organization pays the travel costs.
David Gogishvili, a geographer at the University of Lausanne, told AFP that FIFA had engineered a “sustainability paradox”.
“By reusing existing but geographically dispersed NFL stadiums across a continent, FIFA has created a model that is structurally dependent on high-emission air travel,” he said.
“When leadership sets a precedent by hopping between matches via private jet, it perfectly reflects the broader systemic issue/approach.”
According to Gogishvili, FIFA’s tournament design “normalises hyper-mobility while simultaneously shifting transport costs and carbon burdens onto the host regions and fans.”
John Hocevar, Oceans Campaign Director of Greenpeace USA, was similarly blunt about the president’s match-to-match commuting.
“Having executives take daily flights on highly polluting private jets doesn’t exactly send the message that FIFA recognizes either the cause or its responsibility to be part of the solution to climate change,” he posted on Instagram.
Gianni Infantino, King Willem-Alexander, and Queen Maxima during the Group F match between the Netherlands and Sweden at Houston Stadium on 20 June in Houston, Texas
Qatar jets overload
Critics note that the issue is unlikely to fade after this tournament. Next year, the Women’s World Cup in Brazil — awarded by FIFA in 2024 over a bid that would have been 100 percent accessible by train between Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany — will again involve long-distance travel across a large host nation.
And the logistical challenge is set to intensify for the men’s World Cup centenary in 2030, which is slated for Morocco, Portugal, and Spain, with three matches in South America — alongside a still unresolved prospect of expanding the tournament to 64 teams.
With the 2026 competition drawing celebrities and affluent fans, private aviation is not confined to FIFA’s top brass, adding to the overall footprint tied to the event.
The 2022 World Cup attracted 1,846 private jets to Qatar, the British journal Nature noted — more than the Super Bowl, the Cannes Film Festival, the World Economic Forum in Davos and COP28 combined.
“All of the emissions associated with a World Cup are… luxury rather than subsistence emissions, as the tournament doesn’t need to happen at all,” American academic Tim Walters said last year during a Play the Game debate.
“In this context, the lavish activity of the ultra-wealthy is particularly obscene and dispiriting.”
Latest World Cup coverage
