A local football club has installed new floodlights to lessen its impact on the environment.

Dorchester Town Community Football Club announced new energy-saving floodlights at the Avenue Stadium off Weymouth Avenue. They were put up last week.

The club wanted to reduce its carbon footprint, and with help from Low Carbon Dorset and the Football Foundation’s Premier League LED Floodlighting Fund they were able to achieve this.

Work had started behind the scenes for this process for the club last year after the fund was announced back in July by the Premier League.

The fund is a programme that supports clubs across the National League system and Women’s Football Pyramid to make the switch to LED floodlights in a way for the clubs to become more financially and environmentally sustainable.

Low Carbon Dorset was set up by Dorset Council in 2018 and is part-funded by the UK Government.  Through the programme, organisations in the Dorset Council area can access free advice and grants to help improve energy efficiency and install renewable energy.

It is estimated that the club will save around 5.5 tonnes of CO2 from Dorset air each year.

Wiseman Lighting installed the floodlights and the club had a number of volunteers helping out behind the scenes in the run.

Cameron Dabbs, a director at the club said: “This is a project we’ve been keen on doing for the last couple of years with the focus on the new floodlights to cut down on the club’s carbon emissions.

“These floodlights significantly reduce the emissions by around 5.5 tonnes.”

Dorset Echo: Since the community club installed the 3G pitch it has played host to a number of other teams and organisations including the town’s Ability Counts Kix Start team, and six-a-side matches.

“The pitch is used 40 hours a week by various organisations and if you factor that in compared to the standards of other pitches then you can see the big impact it will make,” Mr Dabbs added.

This is not the first local sports club that are looking to reduce on their carbon footprint and make green changes. In late January, Dorchester Tennis and Squash club announced that they had received a grant of £29,000 from Low Carbon Dorset as part of the Government’s Shared Prosperity Fund as they look to install LED floodlights of their own.