Newsgroup: it.scienza.ambiente
Titolo: Come la vede l'Ecommunist

Una volta tanto ci si filano. E non per menarcelo su Berlusconi (cosa che, 
peraltro, non fanno più da anni, essendosi resi conto che è il minore dei 
nostri mali)
In pratica dice che, dopo che Spagna e Germania hanno tagliato, per via 
della crisi, i loro sprechi "verdi", siamo rimasti tra i più munifici per 
l'eolico. Secondo me c'entra qualcosa l'Alenia di Napoli che, tagliata 
fuori dai contratti aerospazio seri, campa così.
La buona notizia è che abbiamo sempre più centrali nucleari, anche se 
dislocate in Francia e Slovacchia. E' un vero peccato, viste le perdite di 
trasporto e, soprattutto, il fatto che i nostri soldi vanno ad alimentare 
industrie e maestranze straniere.
Purtroppo siamo ancora infestati da troppi komunisti.
Speriamo domani si prendano un'altra bella tosata.
Renewable energy in Italy
Going with the wind
Jun 4th 2009 | ROME
From The Economist print edition
Italy tries to wean itself off imported energy—but it has a long way to go
TOPPING league tables is often cause for congratulations. For Italy, which 
relies on others to provide 86% of its energy needs, leaving it more 
dependent on imports than any other member of the G8 club of rich 
countries, coming first is a reason for concern. So when the G8’s energy 
ministers met in Rome last month, it was little surprise that Claudio 
Scajola, Italy’s minister of economic development, was one of the main 
cheerleaders for investments in clean, indigenous power sources.
Italy’s own supplies of natural gas have fallen sharply over the past 
decade and covered only around 12% of consumption last year, and the 5.2m 
tonnes of crude pumped from local oilfields satisfied just 7% of Italy’s 
needs. Hydro-electricity or “white coal” from dams (mostly in the Alps) 
used to be the biggest domestic source of energy. But for many years it has 
been matched or exceeded by imports of electricity from Italy’s neighbours 
to the north. In a referendum in 1987 Italians voted to close down the 
three nuclear power stations then in operation.
Faced with such dependence on imports, Italy has been making an effort to 
exploit the renewable sources found within its borders. It has long been 
Europe’s leader in geothermal power, using steam produced naturally by hot 
rocks several kilometres below the ground to generate electricity at 
Larderello in Tuscany. Larderello’s turbines produced 5.5 terawatt hours 
(TWh) last year, and Unione Petrolifera, the oil companies’ association and 
the only Italian body making regular energy forecasts, believes that this 
could increase to 7.5TWh by 2020. Even so, it will make only a small 
contribution to total demand, which last year amounted to 337.6TWh.
Corbis Larderello’s field of steams
Prospects for wind power are much better. Ten years ago wind’s part in 
satisfying power demand was tiny, but last year Italy’s turbines produced 
more electricity than its geothermal plants. According to Unione 
Petrolifera, wind farms could be generating 20.5TWh by 2020, about three 
times what they produced last year. And the association forecasts that the 
amount of electricity produced by biomass plants could almost treble to 
11TWh over the same period.
Italy may not have much of its own gas and oil, but sun is rarely in short 
supply and this may offer the brightest long-term prospects. At the end of 
this year Enel, Italy’s state-controlled power company, will bring into 
service a five-megawatt solar-thermal plant that uses innovative 
technology. This is an area in which Enel has a record, having designed and 
built the first concentrating solar-thermal plant connected to a national 
grid over 30 years ago. It also completed Italy’s largest photovoltaic 
installation at Serre Persano near Salerno in 1999. Spain and Germany have 
recently trimmed their subsidies for solar power, leaving Italy’s among the 
most generous in the world.
The subsidies are so lavish because renewable energy is expensive and would 
not be competitive without them. Nomisma Energia, a think-tank, estimates 
that power from photovoltaic cells costs €0.40 ($0.56) per kilowatt hour 
(kWh). Even more established renewable sources such as wind (€0.07/kWh) and 
biomass (€0.08/kWh) produce electricity that costs more than that derived 
from coal (€0.05/kWh with coal at $60 per tonne) or gas (€0.06/kWh with oil 
at $55 a barrel). The higher costs are borne by electricity users in Italy, 
where tariffs are above those in other European countries, thanks mainly to 
the use of natural gas for power production but also to weak competition. 
Economies of scale and technological improvements mean that the price of 
wind power is falling, however, and it could close the gap with fossil-fuel 
generation, especially if Europe’s carbon price increases.
But Davide Tabarelli, chairman of Nomisma Energia, says forecasts of a boom 
in wind and solar are optimistic and that Italy will not meet the goal set 
by the European Union that renewables should provide 12% of energy 
consumption by 2010. Umberto Quadrino, the boss of Edison, Italy’s 
second-biggest utility, agrees. He thinks Italy will have to reverse its 
ban on nuclear power. In the meantime, Enel is investing in French nuclear 
power-stations, with a view to exporting the power to Italy. It also owns 
reactors in Slovakia.
The government, too, hopes to revive nuclear power. But Italy is held back 
by a leaden bureaucracy. The government says it will cut red tape to get 
new nuclear stations built. Reactors will face far more public resistance 
than wind farms and solar plants, however. For the moment, Italy’s leading 
position in import dependency looks secure.

 l'eolico.
Pardon, solare. Rubbia sta vincendo?

"F. Bertolazzi" <TOGL...@MAIUSCOLEtdd.it> ha scritto nel messaggio 
news:124rieegxjebv$.11rv4vplz2ng8$.dlg@40tude.net...

Se non ricordo male anche dell' eolico, anche se non siamo esattamente un 
Paese granch� ventoso (vabb�, tutto fa brodo...). In generale, mi sembra che 
i governi in questi ultimi anni non abbiano lesinato incentivi alle fonti 
rinnovabili, ma i risultati (almeno finora) sono stati inferiori alle 
aspettative; credo perch� non si sia puntato su quelle fonti rinnovabili che 
sono pi� adatte alla nostra situazione, come l' eolico per i Paesi del Nord 
Europa (per es. la geotermia, "invenzione" italiana o il solare 
fotovoltaico)