Decarbonising is the only way to a livable future

A green Italy, which wants to make sustainable development, the circular economy and clean energy a winning model. This is the Italy that I dream of and for which I work every day at the Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security: a national community that builds its future responsibly, that puts its great professionalism at the service of the country, today and for generations to come. World Environment Day is the most suitable opportunity to reflect on the path that Italy must take to reach the goal of carbon neutrality in 2050. An objective that must be pursued with tenacity and determination because it will only be achievable if we know how to implement actions capable of reorienting both the country’s productive system and our individual and collective behavior towards sustainability. The goal of decarbonisation is not an option: it is the only way to have a livable tomorrow. We are bitterly reminded of this by the tragedies that take place in the country due to increasingly frequent and increasingly violent extreme weather events, as we have recently seen in Emilia Romagna.

However, the ecological transition – and I refer to the admonition of Pope Francis in his Laudato SI’ – must be “integral”, capable of keeping together the reasons of the environment and the social and economic ones. It must also be perceived as a great opportunity for change, capable of giving more work, more widespread well-being. It is necessary to intervene organically throughout the Italian system.

Transport will have to become green, today still 90% fueled by hydrocarbons. The future of this sector is electric but not only. There are biofuels for which we are discussing with the EU and synthetic fuels, e-fuels, which can guarantee a share of “clean” heat engines.

Homes and offices, millions of properties, which today contribute significantly to greenhouse gas emissions as well as fine dust emissions that often make the air in our cities unbreathable, especially in the Po Valley, will have to become green. Also on this front we have started discussions with the EU, to make possible a gradual process that does not turn into a further and very heavy tax on the house for all Italian families. Incentives will certainly be needed, which in part already exist, but the model cannot be that of 110%, unsustainable for the state coffers.

The entire production system will also have to become green: from small companies with solar panels on their warehouses, to farms with biogas plants, fields with agri-voltaic systems and tractors with biomethane, to heavy industry with hydrogen.

The PNRR provides funding in all these fields. We need to spend these huge resources well. Without approximations and with transparency, but also without triggering a controversy every day about phantom delays and hypothetical losses of funding. We have to implement complex transformations while respecting the grid of European and international targets. Transformations that will be coordinated through the National Energy and Climate Plan which is being updated and will be defined, after a process shared with all social and institutional players, by June 2024.

But we are the country that has the most sun in Europe, we are the country that in just a few years has become a leader in the circular economy, we are the country of talents and winning challenges. The ecological transition is a challenge that we cannot lose. That’s the challenge
of our future.