Lawn Tennis Association
Learn how Pledgeball and the LTA are empowering tennis clubs to make a difference on sustainability
Pledgeball’s innovative partnership with the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) engages tennis clubs across the UK in sustainability initiatives, encouraging members to make eco-friendly pledges and highlighting the LTA’s sustainability resources.
Launched in 2023, the LTA Pledgeball League invites players at registered venues to commit to green pledges in their daily lives, promoting healthy competition among clubs to achieve significant carbon reductions. Pledges made through the Pledgeball platform contribute to each club’s position in the league. Top-performing venues are rewarded with grants to support further sustainability projects on-site, while individuals can win tickets to high-profile events.
In 2024, 39 clubs took part, with members making 2,820 pledges — a 26.7% increase from the previous year — resulting in the collective saving of 1.4 million kg of carbon emissions. This high level of engagement has created a butterfly effect across the world of British tennis, inspiring an increasing number of clubs to address sustainability directly.
Carolyn, Sutton Churches Tennis"It was easy to do. The element of competition..attracted different groups of members…What’s come out of it is discovering the LTA’s sustainability plan…things that have come out of that - we did the RSPB birdwatch this year, we’ve built a bug house, we’re looking at LED lights…there’s so many ideas on there that have got us thinking and talking.. On our committee agenda each month now we have a sustainability heading."
This is good news on two fronts because the partnership is part of the LTA’s Environmental Sustainability Plan, which supports the tennis community across Britain to have a positive impact, as well as transforming its own operations and events to become more sustainable.
Gill, Ilminster Bowling & Tennis Club."From not having really looked around our ground, we started to look around and see what else we could do. We were already recycling our tennis balls, we’d donated our windbreaks to an allotment society…we now have our rubbish in separate bins, we have one dedicated car journey for our away journeys, we have push on lights in the toilets…and now looking ahead we’re installing LED lights, and we took our broken net to a net company who restitched it for us.”