Infantino has attended two matches a day several times during the tournament's group stage - often in cities hundreds of miles apart, and on some days he has taken three separate flights.
FIFA president Gianni Infantino has been blasted for jetting 31,000 miles between World Cup matches in a fortnight - after pledging to cut climate-crippling emissions. He has made 27 flights between cities across tournament co-hosts the US, Mexico and Canada to watch 24 games.
In FIFA’s sustainability and human rights strategy for the World Cup he said: “Whether we speak about climate, human rights, diseases or disabilities, we are committed to play our part.”
But BBC investigators who tracked the flightpaths of a private jet linked to FIFA and Infantino said the climate impact of its travel in a fortnight was equivalent to that of 78 people over a year.
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Infantino has attended two matches a day several times during the tournament's group stage - often in cities hundreds of miles apart. On some days he has taken three separate flights.
According to the Beeb he is using a Gulfstream G650ER to negotiate his way around the biggest World Cup in history. The longest flight Infantino has taken in the first two weeks was 2,800 miles from Vancouver to Miami on June 13 after watching Australia play Turkey.
On June 22 he flew just 92 miles from Philadelphia to Teterboro Airport in New Jersey for a TV interview but jetted on to watch matches in Boston and Toronto later that day. His furthest single day of travel - not including overnight flights - was June 15 when he flew more than 2,700 miles across the US from Miami to Seattle to watch Belgium play Egypt.
He then travelled 960 miles south to Los Angeles where he attended Iran v New Zealand in the evening. Analysis shows the aircraft travelled at least 31,144 miles and spent more than 66 hours in the air between the start of the tournament and June 27.
Flying by private jet is the most carbon-intensive way to travel - producing greenhouse gases that heat the atmosphere, driving global warming and climate change. A FIFA spokesman said the president ‘routinely travels together with relevant officials on business and tournament-related matters’ striving to visit member associations ‘whenever he can’.
“Sometimes travel is organised on commercial (including low-cost) airlines and sometimes it is on private charter, depending on which is more efficient and cost-effective under the circumstances,” they added. Freddie Daley, who works for sport climate action network Cool Down, said Infantino's World Cup travel was ‘symptomatic of FIFA’s failings on the environment and sustainability’.
“The fact that Infantino's choosing to use a private jet is just completely at odds with the level of leadership that we need to see at the top of FIFA on environmental issues,” said Daley, a researcher at Sussex University. Denise Auclair, a sustainable travel expert at the European Federation for Transport and Environment, said private jets have a ‘completely disproportionate impact’.
“They are five to 14 times more polluting than commercial planes and 50 times more than trains,” she added. FIFA has committed to reducing emissions by 50% by 2030 and reaching net-zero by 2040.
At this year's tournament the world football governing body said it was hosting teams regionally to cut ‘reliance on long-haul travel for a significant proportion of attendees’. It encouraged attendees to increase energy efficiency by promoting the use of electric cars, public transport and water conservation - and used existing stadiums rather than building new ones.
But a report from Scientists for Global Responsibility predicted the overall carbon footprint of this World Cup could reach nine million tonnes of greenhouse gas CO2e. That would equate to almost double the average for the past four World Cups making this year's tournament the most polluting ever.
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