2010 Winter Games

October 28, 2009

Renner skis toward 2010, pushes for climate action

Rob Klovance
bchydro.com

Sara Renner lives with fellow Olympian Thomas Grandi and daughter Aria in a small home in what she calls a "community of mansions." She tries to keep the car parked, and she's taking a shot at using solar energy to heat the home's hot water and floors.

But Renner also recognizes that as an elite cross-country skier who flies to events and training across the globe, her carbon footprint is not exactly small. So while she pushes for climate action among friends and colleagues, it's going to be a gentle, if firm, push.

"I see the hypocrisy of my own life," says the Canmore athlete who won silver with Beckie Scott in the team sprint at the 2006 Winter Games in Turin. "I see how you can be very judgmental in the environmental movement, because no one can possibly not have an impact.

"I just try to speak with my heart,  and I think it's the most important thing. I think it really helps when you have a child. Everyone loves someone on this planet, so everyone has a desire to preserve the planet the way it is."

Renner and Grandi, who quit the Canadian alpine ski team to be a stay-at-home dad while mom took one last shot at Olympic gold in 2010, are very much a part of the environmental movement. They recently led a rally in Canmore that was part of 350.org's International Day of Climate Action. The idea was to send a message to politicians and other leaders to push for an ambitious agreement on carbon emission reductions, one that can actually reduce current carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million, which many scientists believe is the upper limit at which humanity is safe.

"Individual, personal lifestyle changes will not save us," she says. "It has to come from the top - there has to be political will to change, and 350 is about sending a message that the world cares."

Offsets as an option

Renner will help try to minimize her air travel by making one trip to World Cup ski events in Europe instead of several. She buys carbon offsets for her flights and combines some of those ski trips with some vacation time instead of booking spring vacations to warm places the way she used to.

 And with mixed success, Renner is trying to convince other skiers to buy carbon offsets as well.

"I definitely have teammates who are buying offsets, and I think that's admirable," says Renner, who helps promote offsets through her work with David Suzuki's Play it Cool initiative. "Skiers don't have a lot of money, but they realize the importance of this. And then there are some people who probably don't believe in climate change and who would rather buy a new iPod than buy offsets for their flights. You fight the battles you can fight, and some you just let go."

Three people, 700 square feet

Count Renner as another so-called environmentalist who believes the pluses of an eco-sensitive lifestyle far outweigh any inconveniences. That means the joy of biking rather than driving, the taste of juicy tomatoes plucked from her own greenhouse, and the sense that 700 square feet, plus a rented-out basement, is more than enough room for a three-member family.

"We live in a community of mansions," she says. "Our house is absolutely perfect - it's 700 square feet and we have a basement. It's perfect for our needs, but in a growing resort community, our house is beginning to look like a dwarf."

She reports that the solar-heated hot water was great over the summer, but she's not sure how well the solar collection with deliver in-floor heating along with the hot water this winter. But then again, winters aren't what they used to be, and that's one big reason Renner and Grandi are committed to climate action.

"Through ski racing, it's obvious that there's been a general climate shift," she says. "It's crazy, but over my career, snow has been so much less predictable... Both Thomas and I have become completely reliant on snow-making. And snow-making is dependant on low temperatures - you just don't have that predictable cold anymore."

The 2010 Olympics in Whistler will be her last, she says, even if she hopes to hang around the Canadian cross-country ski team as a mentor, or perhaps as a cook. Asked about what else she'll do after the Games, she serves up a tentative travel plan, minus the flights.

"We've talked about maybe buying a Sprinter van – they're very fuel efficient – and going on a surf trip to Mexico," she says. "We want to keep it open and we want to have another kid. So we have a bit of a buffer - we can afford to be a bit vagabondish."

Rob Klovance is managing editor of bchydro.com.