Clean technologies: Italy's potential for circular economy, batteries and agrifood

Cleantech for Italy, a coalition bringing together various players in the Italian clean technology ecosystem, was presented at the Chamber of Deputies. The aim: to accelerate the development of a sector that can bring competitiveness, sustainability, energy security and new industrial opportunities for the country. According to the promoters, cleantech is in fact a strategic lever for strengthening and relaunching the national production fabric, also by virtue of the solid industrial base and the high quality of scientific research conducted in this sector. Especially at a time when the new season of duties and trade barriers announced by the Trump administration is pushing towards a structural readjustment of value chains. A solicitation that adds to the challenges to which Italian manufacturing is already called, from rising energy costs to the contraction of production.

Cleantech for Italy is an initiative launched in 2024 with the support of Breakthrough Energy, Bill Gates' climate foundation, and the European Climate Foundation. As of today, the coalition brings together research centres and universities (Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Politecnico di Torino), companies (Daze, Enapter, Energy Dome, Magaldi Green Energy, Novac, Sinergy Flow, Squim, Tau Group, WSense), investors (360 Capital, Ambienta Sgr, Coreangels Climate, Eureka! Venture Sgr, Maia Ventures, Mito Technology, Neva Sgr, Primo Capital Sgr) and others will join in the coming weeks.

"Italy possesses a wealth of skills and an extraordinary potential for innovation in cleantech," explains Federico Cuppoloni, director of Cleantech for Italy: "However, we need to bridge the gap between innovation and industrialisation: Italy is developing an important network of investment funds dedicated to the early stages of technological development, with more than €1 billion invested from 2019 to date, €350 million from mid-2024 alone. What is missing is the financial and regulatory infrastructure that can enable innovative Italian companies to scale up and be globally competitive'. Cleantech for Italy therefore aims to serve as a reference platform to foster exchange between industry players and public decision-makers in order to identify tools to foster the industrialisation of emerging cleantech solutions. The discussion with the parliamentary intergroup for sustainable development has highlighted the need for industrial policies in this direction.

Yesterday's event was also an opportunity to present the Cleantech for Italy Manifesto, a document that summarises the group's programmatic objectives: commercialisation of innovation, creation of the market starting from domestic demand, identification of financial instruments to support advanced stages, revision of regulations that slow down the initial phase (e.g. long authorisation times that discourage investors), and finally: skills training.

"In Italy we produce high quality research and we have the capacity to finance it, with the emergence of new vertical funds in recent years, thanks also to the work of Cdp Venture Capital. We lack the part that links it to industry,' Cuppoloni emphasises. 'We need to give these investments a future through mixed finance instruments for industrialisation. That is why we will also open up to infrastructure funds capable of intervening in the deployment of technologies'. Which are the most promising? "Investments in the circular economy are doubling year after year. Here Italy expresses European leadership, also thanks to the role of multi-utilities. The world of materials, which absorbs the expertise of the chemical sector, has reached its maximum investment in 2024. The work on energy company storage systems such as Energy Dome or Sinergy Flow has potentially global applications. Finally, agrifood, from generative agriculture to precision monitoring, expresses an important part of cleantech,' Cuppoloni concludes.