A July 28 article in the Tokyo Shimbun reported that some 13,000 new air conditioning units had been installed in rooms built for the Olympic Village. Once the Paralympics are finished, these rooms will be remodeled for sale as condominiums and the air conditioners removed, along with 5,000 toilets and 4,000 water heaters.

According to the organizing committee, they will be returned to the company from which they were procured, presumably to be reused in new construction. However, a representative of the second-hand sales industry said that used air conditioners are notoriously difficult to redistribute due to storage and installation issues, and most usually end up being thrown away.

It’s too early for Tokyo Shimbun to follow up on this story, but it contrasts sharply with a March 25, 2019, article in the Asahi Shimbun, an Olympic sponsor, which reported that, following their use during the Olympics and Paralympics, the air conditioners would be given free to schools and various public welfare facilities. The article also said that when the organizing committee accepted bids for the air conditioners, one condition was that the sales agent had to secure places that would take the units afterward and report to the committee about where they ended up, thus complying with the International Olympic Committee’s pledge to make the Games as sustainable as possible.