So the results of the Women’s World Cup are in, and Spain reign triumphant.The Iberian victory brought to a head what had been a truly tremendous tournament, with some electrifying performances from all teams involved.Here at Project Solar, we’ve spent the last few weeks dreaming of bringing football home once more as England trailblazed through to a historic final against Spain.Although an England win wasn’t meant to be, the Lionesses delivered incredible performances in every match. We’re very proud of them for taking an England team to a World Cup final for the first time since the 1966 winning match, and for being the first ever women’s England lineup to do so.During the tournament, we felt so inspired that we got to dreaming about how all the energy expended on the pitch could be harnessed and used in off-pitch settings!If you follow our Project Solar blog, you may remember that when the Men’s World Cup was on last year, we had some fun with energy-based statistics. During the men’s tournament, we took statistics from each football match played to analyse how much energy was burned by the players, and calculated how long that energy could be used to power domestic appliances.We decided to do the same for the Women’s World Cup’s biggest contenders, and see how they fared when it came to generating energy on and off the pitch.It’s all just a bit of fun, but we want to hold on to that positive England inspiration for as long as possible!So without further ado, let’s take a look at who the real movers, shakers, and energy makers of this year’s Women’s World Cup were!
Working it out
As was the case in the men’s tournament, the football players at the Women’s World Cup have produced an absolutely staggering amount of energy.We used data published by FIFA after each game to estimate the number of calories burned by the players, based on the overall distance the player had run in the matches.The calculations took into account the height, age, and weight of each player for added accuracy. It wasn’t just the players’ running time that we looked at, either. We also took into consideration the walking they did between runs, their lateral movements across the pitch, and the energy required behind every boot of the ball to another player.We then converted the number of calories burned into watt hours, which is used to measure the power needed to run appliances. Once we had that figure, we were able to estimate how long we the football players could provide an energy supply to a range of appliances and facilities.
The top pitch performers
By the end stages of the tournament, the four teams left competing were England, Spain, Sweden, and the hosts Australia.We whittled our focus down to one player from each team, and came up with some fascinating and fun stats.Just before Sunday’s World Cup Final match, we posted these figures on our Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn pages to share in the electric atmosphere in the leadup to the big game.
Here’s what the statistics revealed:
England’s Lucy Bronze ran an impressive 72km throughout the tournament, generating 4,368 kilowatt hours of energy. To put that into truly British terms, that’s enough energy to boil 1,456 two-litre kettles and make a whopping 11,648 cups of tea! Biscuit, anyone?Let’s compare that performance to Spain’s Jennifer Hermoso. She ran an astonishing 78 km, just 6km more than Bronze, and generated 5,336 kilowatt hours of energy. If you need help visualising that, that’s enough power to run a 55′ 4K TV for over 9,361 hours!The semi-finalists were not to be passed over, either. Sweden and Australia players Amanda Ilestedt and Katrina Gorry respectively represented their teams with supercharged powerhouse performances.Ilestedt ran 61 km, producing 4,950 kilowatts of energy, while Gorry ran 68km and generated 4,074 kilowatts. Ilestedt’s effort was enough to run a 2-man sauna for 825 hours! Meanwhile Gorry could have ‘put another shrimp on the barbie’ – well, on 1,851 barbecues for an hour, to be precise – and she could have grilled over 16,462 burgers in the process!Powerful stuff!
More power to you
So now the World Cup’s all over, Spain go home with the coveted trophy in hand, and we proudly welcome our Lionesses back to the UK.What can we take away from this incredible tournament? Well, if the Women’s World Cup has taught us anything, it’s that we have nothing to lose by taking steps forward into the future.Interest in women’s football has come on in leaps and bounds in recent years. With sheer determination, talent and grit, the women’s teams have proved that talent is talent, no matter where it comes from and who is playing. They have also taught us that what’s new doesn’t have to undermine or replace the old, rather the two complement each other and together can develop and move forward to inspire ideas and innovations suited to the modern age.In a similar way, a commitment to solar energy in your home could be just the new approach that you need to boost your existing energy provision. Investing in a solar panel installation doesn’t necessarily mean completely cutting yourself off from the National Grid’s power supply. It does, however, mean becoming more independent from fossil fuels, and making significant savings on your energy bills, at a time when we could all do with it!
Bringing solar home
There are big changes afoot for the future of renewable energy. Governments around the world have been investing money and developmental research into green projects, in a bid to reach Net Zero. This has resulted in increasing availability and attainability of renewable energy for ordinary homeowners.As we move away from fossil fuels towards renewable solutions, the time is now to get ahead of the game and start enjoying the benefits of solar power in your home. If you would like to do your bit to save the environment and make some savings on your energy bills, make the initial investment – you won’t look back.To stay on the ball with the latest updates in solar energy developments, follow our Project Solar blog, or get in touch to start your solar panel journey today.