Eco-Conscious Practices in Your Rowing Routine

The most useful eco-conscious practices in your rowing routine are sharing lifts, keeping kit for longer and stopping plants and animals hitching a ride between waters. For most rowers, travel is the biggest part of the footprint, so start there. The smaller habits, such as washing kit cooler and taking litter home, are cheap and worth keeping. They just won’t outweigh a long solo drive to the club.

The changes, in rough order of impact

The order below is a rule of thumb, because every rower’s travel and kit are different.

Change	Effort	Why it matters
Share lifts, or swap one trip a week for a home erg session	Low	Travel is usually the largest share
Keep kit longer and buy second-hand	Low	Avoids the footprint of making a replacement
Check Clean Dry between waters	Low	Stops invasive species spreading
Keep clear of nests and ease your wash	Low	Protects banks and wildlife
Wash kit at 30°C, in full loads, and air-dry it	Low	Cuts energy use each wash
Clean boats with a bucket, not a hose	Low	Less water and less runoff

Travel: the worked sum

Government journey figures put an average petrol or diesel car at about 0.22 kg of CO2e per mile, against about 0.07 kg for a mile by national rail, according to the Department for Transport’s method notes.

Here’s a rough sum for a club 5 miles from home:

• 10 miles round trip x 4 trips a week x 46 weeks = 1,840 miles a year
• 1,840 x 0.22 kg = about 405 kg of CO2e
• Share the car with one crewmate and your share falls to about 200 kg

Real figures depend on your car and how you drive, so treat that as a scale, not a measurement. Cycling or walking removes the journey entirely if the route is safe. Swapping one of those four trips for an erg session at home cuts about 100 kg in the same sum. Our rowing workouts for summer fitness give you some sessions to use at home.

Keep kit for longer

The greenest kit is what you already own. Repair splits and zips, and buy hard-wearing items when you do need something. Club kit swaps are common, and second-hand works well for clothing. Be wary of vague “eco” labels. Look for specifics such as recycled content, then judge whether the item will last.

The same logic applies to a machine. A Concept2 RowErg at around £990 (checked 30 Oct 2026), used 3 times a week for 5 years, is 780 sessions, or about £1.27 a session. A machine that gathers dust has the opposite maths, in money and in materials. Our guide to finding a Concept2 for sale covers what to check on a used one. Looking after boats and machines has the same effect, so read how to maintain your rowing equipment.

Wash kit and boats with less

In a Which? test, switching from 40°C to 30°C saved 38% of the energy used in a wash. Run full loads and air-dry where you can, because technical kit usually dries quickly anyway.

For boats, blades and machines:

• Use a bucket and sponge rather than a running hose.
• Use mild cleaners sparingly, and keep harsh solvents away from the water.
• Wash on grass or a designated area, if your club has one, so runoff doesn’t go straight into the river.
• Bin used rags, tape and sponges. Don’t leave them at the water’s edge.

Our guide to cleaning your rowing machine gives the routine for the erg. An air or water erg needs no mains power, only batteries for the monitor, which makes it a low-energy way to train. If you’re choosing between home cardio machines, rowing vs spinning for weight loss compares cost and muscles used.

Food, drink and waste

Take a refillable bottle and bring snacks with little packaging. On longer trips, store food in a sealed container so nothing blows overboard. For the far end of the scale, our overview of rowing to Hawaii shows the preparation an ocean crossing takes. Our guide to hydration when rowing covers how much you need.

Take all litter home, including tape and wrappers from the boat bay. Never throw anything overboard, food waste included. Pick up litter you spot when it’s safe, and take care with fishing line and sharp objects.

Check Clean Dry

Invasive plants and animals travel between waters on hulls, blades, trailers and shoes. The routine has three steps, set out in Check Clean Dry guidance:

1. Check. Look over boats, kit, clothing and footwear when you leave the water. Remove mud, weed and animals, leave them at the site, and drain any water.
2. Clean. Wash everything as soon as you can. Pay attention to damp places that are hard to see, such as boat fittings.
3. Dry. Dry everything for as long as you can before using it elsewhere. Some invasive species can survive for over two weeks in damp conditions.

This matters most on regatta and head race days, when boats arrive from several rivers. Ask your club whether the venue has its own rules.

Respect wildlife and banks

The RSPB gives March to September as the main nesting season, and nests in use or being built are protected by law. On the water that means:

• Keep well away from nesting birds and stay out of reed beds.
• Ease the pressure near banks, because wash can erode them and flood nests.
• Coaches in launches should watch their wash for the same reason.
• Follow your club’s rules, which often vary by season.

Our page on different bodies of water explains what to expect on each kind of stretch.

Report pollution, and bring your club along

In England, call the Environment Agency’s 24-hour incident hotline on 0800 80 70 60 if you see pollution, dead fish or fish gasping for air, or a collapsed bank. Note the location and the time first. Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own reporting routes.

Small changes spread when a club adopts them. Suggest one at a time: a lift-share list, a refill point, a litter pick after a regatta, or a kit swap. A lift-share list is the one to start with, since the sum above shows it does the most.