Energy, innovation, and simplification represent three inseparable dimensions of a single systemic challenge that Italy and Europe are called to face in a deeply changed geopolitical and economic context.
The crisis of the Strait of Hormuz has brought attention back to the structural fragility of the European and Italian energy system, highlighting that the energy transition is not a sequential process, with fossil fuels progressively and orderly replaced by renewable ones. Historically, energy transitions last for decades, and in the meantime, the dependence on fossil fuels—and on the geographical routes through which they transit—remains structural: geographical chokepoints have become a new form of strategic vulnerability that affects crude oil supplies just as much as liquefied natural gas and refined products, with knock-on effects on industry, agriculture, and inflation.
For Italy, this vulnerability has precise contours. Gas represents about 36% of the national energy mix, but over 94% is imported from abroad. Italian manufacturing—which is worth about 15% of GDP and over 60% of exports—recorded a production contraction in 2026, with particular difficulties in sectors such as chemicals, iron and steel, and refining. All of these are highly energy-intensive. In this framework, the enhancement of domestic hydrocarbon reserves, where the infrastructures already exist, has been indicated as a concrete and rapidly implementable lever to reduce dependence and support competitiveness, without thereby renouncing decarbonization goals.
An often underestimated aspect of the energy transition concerns the dependence on critical raw materials and rare earths, necessary for solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, and advanced technological components. In this sector, China exercises almost total control, not only over production but also over refining. The risk is that Europe, having emerged from its energy dependence on Russia, will end up with a technological and material dependence on China. Implications here go beyond the economy and touch upon security and industrial sovereignty. The same applies to large offshore wind components, where Chinese penetration into the global market is putting European manufacturers in difficulty. Added to this is the increasingly close link between energy, data, and artificial intelligence: the data centers and computing infrastructures needed to support the digital transformation have significant energy requirements, which demand planning and a systemic vision.
On the renewable sources front, the National Integrated Energy and Climate Plan (PNIEC) sets ambitious goals for Italy: 79 GW of installed photovoltaic capacity by 2030 and 94 GWh of new energy storage. The signals from the market are encouraging: the strong demand recorded in the first auction for storage capacity demonstrates that technologies, skills, and capital are available. The real obstacle is therefore not the lack of resources or interest, but the slowness of the authorization processes and the fragmentation of competences among levels of government.
A reliable energy system cannot, however, rely solely on renewable plants. The intermittency of solar and wind sources actually requires parallel investments in storage, smart grids, and interconnections. In the absence of an adequate grid infrastructure and without a stable baseload source, the system remains vulnerable, however, as demonstrated by the blackout that hit the Iberian Peninsula in April 2025. In this context, even new-generation nuclear power can be an option worthy of research and further study, as a possible component of a diversified and low-emission energy mix.
On all these issues, the quality of public decisions depends decisively on the availability and accessibility of data—environmental, climate, energy, and territorial. A true national strategic infrastructure is called for, not just information archives. In this sense, environmental monitoring platforms, satellite territory observation systems, tools for the prevention of hydrogeological instability, and water resource management tools all represent assets that must be made available to public and private decision-makers.
In such a framework, to simplify does not mean to reduce environmental protections. It means rather to make decision-making processes more effective, more transparent, and faster, through digitalization and the interoperability of data among administrations. A critical knot in this sense is represented by the Environmental Impact Assessment (VIA) procedure, which continues to generate uncertainty. Recent administrative jurisprudence has identified some priority areas for intervention which, without backsliding on environmental protection, guarantee the certainty of the timeframe of the proceedings—an essential condition for the attractiveness of investments in the Italian energy system.
True simplification originates from knowledge: knowing what the rules are, knowing who can make decisions, and understanding the relevant timeframe. These are all essential conditions for attracting investments and leading change in Italy. Today, the greatest risk is not making a wrong decision: it is arriving too late.
The energy transition requires not only scientific rigor, pragmatism, and the ability to evaluate all available options without ideological prejudices, but also—and above all—collaboration. Collaboration is needed between institutions and businesses, between research and industry, between public and private sectors, and between different levels of government. Only by acting harmoniously on all three levers—energy, innovation, and simplification—will it be possible to proceed effectively in pursuing the competitiveness, security, and sustainability of Italy.