Renewable energy: Italy aims for +126% in 2030 over 2021

A decisive push on the renewables, where the expected power from now until 2030 has been set at 131 gigawatts (126% more than in 2021), of which the main slice will be provided by solar (79.2 GW) and wind power, with an increase in capacity of about 74 GW over 2021 (of which about +57 GW from photovoltaic and about +17 GW from wind power). While, on the emissions cut front, against an expected reduction in the total level from 2005 to 2030 of about 305 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent (MtCO2eq), it is estimated that emissions from industrial plants bound by Ets regulations will be reduced by about 164 MtCO2eq (about -66%), thus reaching the EU target bar (-62%), while in the non-Ets sectors (civil transport and agriculture) the decrease will be 139 MtCO2eq (about -40.5%), still far from the European targets and therefore further efforts will be needed. New interventions are also planned to strengthen the electricity transport network, not only from a domestic point of view but also towards foreign countries, while on gas it will be necessary to proceed along the path of diversification, undertaken since 2022, increasing import capacity, completing, internally, the construction of the Adriatic Line and developments for the Tap (the trans-Adriatic gas pipeline) and strengthening Italy's role as a European energy hub and supply corridor for renewables in the Mediterranean area. More pieces, therefore, which must also provide for a further acceleration and simplification of the authorisation processes both for grid development works and for the connection of renewable energy plants.

These are some of the objectives put down in black and white in the final version of the integrated national energy and climate plan that the Italian government sent to Brussels yesterday. "Today (yesterday for those reading, ed.) our country is endowed with a planning tool that very pragmatically traces our energy and climate path, overcoming the unrealistic approaches of the past," commented the Minister for the Environment and Energy Security, Gilberto Pichetto Fratin, who flew to Cadarache, in the south of France, to take part in the celebration for the completion of the superconducting magnets of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (Iter) project. "Nuclear fusion is one of the most ambitious scientific challenges of our time, and Iter is the concrete manifestation of our commitment to tackle it," said Pichetto Fratin as he met with a representation of Italian personnel involved in the programme (see other article on page).

An important recognition of the role of nuclear power, which was also outlined in the Pniec, as the minister himself announced in an interview with Il Sole 24 Ore, illustrating two scenario hypotheses to 2050 containing a share of energy production from the atom, based on the initial findings of the National Platform for Sustainable Nuclear Power: 8 gigawatts to 2050 so as to cover about 11% of the national electricity demand or about 16 GW, still with the same deadline, but without the limitation on the installable potential, considering the development, says the Plan, of the entire reactor potential - especially small fission plants (Smr-Small modular reactor of generation III+, Amr-Advanced modular reactor of generation IV and micro-reactors) - derived from the platform.

The Pniec, then - which aims, as also recalled by Deputy Minister Vannia Gava "at the objectives of technological neutrality while accompanying families and businesses" - highlights the complementary role in the decarbonisation of transport exerted by direct electrification and the use of biofuels, which will have a significant think in the short term (by 2030, 4.687 ktoe of liquid biofuels compared to 1,415 ktoe in 2021, of which 977 ktoe will come from first-generation biofuels and the rest from advanced biofuels). The Plan also envisages an important contribution from electric vehicles by 2030 (6.5 million), of which pure (Bev, i.e. powered exclusively by battery, 4.3 million) and plug-in electric hybrids (Phev, i.e. cars with the possibility of external recharging, 2.2 million), which appear to be, the document states, 'a solution for private urban mobility capable of contributing to the reduction of final consumption in private transport for the same distance and of favouring the integration of production from electric renewables'.