They could have written it, but they didn't. They could have foreseen it explicitly, but they took care of it. They should have declared it openly, but in front of the interests of lobbies and state affairs they denied Sardinia and the Sardinians any sacrosanct right of equality in terms of methanisation. They could have foreseen the equalization of energy costs, both for gas and electricity, like any other Italian region, but they preferred to use every possible formula to deny it. The “Energy Decree”, the one signed by Mario Draghi, is the exact photograph of the relations between the Italian State and the Sardinian Region. A single fact is enough to understand the gravity of that act that the Prime Minister could sign ad horas : in the whole game of the European ecological transition the only Region about to be commissioned is Sardinia. There is not a single case, neither of laws nor of emergency decrees, in which the Government has ever assumed full decision-making power on a delicate game like energy. Yet, Draghi & Cingolani, Premier and Minister of the Environment, have chosen to impose, with a decree of the President of the Council of Ministers, those Dpcm that are used in the event of war or pandemic, new servitude, land and sea, in order to achieve, on the heads of Sardinia and the Sardinians, the objectives set by the ecological agenda of Brussels.
Sardinia landfill
The synthesis is eloquent: we throw most of the wind turbines and the expanses of photovoltaic panels necessary to reach the parameters set by the NRP on the Nuraghi Island. The Sardinians, therefore, will suffer the environmental and landscape devastation without any minimal impact, neither economic, let alone employment, indeed. That wind and solar energy, which cannot be accumulated except by transforming it into hydrogen, will be sent, without wasting time, directly to Sicily for use in the Italian electricity system. And it is no coincidence that one of the nerve centers of the decree, improperly named after Sardinia, provides for the billionaire construction of a cable-leash that, starting from the Cagliari coast, will reach Sicily with a single objective: to put the energy produced by the wind and sun of Sardinia. Wind turbines, photovoltaic expanses and the electric cable connecting with Sicily are the only certainties of the decree that the former European banker is about to pass. Everything else is fog, thick and heavy, starting with the pseudo "methanization" of the island. Scrolling through the rules you can touch nothing with your hand. The first element is the one that limits the range of action of the provision that Palazzo Chigi is about to sign. For the sake of clarity, it must be said that the margin of maneuver of the Government had already been defined in the law that had imposed the commissioner of Sardinia on the subject of energy. In the norm, article 60 of decree law 76/2020, the infrastructural and economic limit that the State imposed on the methanization of the island had been put in black and white.
Sorcerer's apprentices
The "excuse" of the decree, contained in the preamble, was even suggestive: "The relaunch of the productive activities of the island". A plan to be implemented using a legislative formula by sorcerer's apprentices, capable of hiding the evidence: in reality it is an act that has nothing to do with the development of the island, much less productive activities. And, in fact, the State, with the decree that Draghi is about to sign, plans to carry out this "fake" methanisation, also for tariff purposes, by connecting the terminals of the Tuscan coast only "up to the regasification terminals to be built in the Region itself. (Sardinia ed) ". You don't need to be an expert to understand the "subtlety" of makeup. The Government, in fact, through real medieval-style crossovers, will pay for the strengthening of the Tuscan regasifiers from which the "barges", they are called exactly, to transport natural gas "up" to the regasifiers that are planned to be built in Portoscuso, in Porto Torres and perhaps in Oristano.
"Up" to the coast
It is that "up" to the coast, reaffirmed in every way in the decree, which contains the trap of the Government. In practice, Draghi and Ministers, with this step give a double gift to the large energy groups, especially the gas ones: on the one hand they pay them for the infrastructure to bring natural gas "up" to the Sardinian coast and, then, they leave them the free will to transport it wherever they want and, above all, free to impose on the Sardinians the prices they want. All passages declined with the skill of the lyricists of the Palazzo, who have always been able to hide behind a rule the most imposing of state rip-offs. Article 2 of the decree, in addition to the wind invasion and the cable leash with Sicily, provides for some interventions that speak volumes about the project that the Draghi executive is pursuing. The salient points in the field of gas are hinged on two sides, that of the Tuscan coast and that of the north and south of the island. The first interventions concern "the adaptation of the Panigaglia regasification terminal to allow the loading of LNG on barges" and "guarantee the functioning of the virtual connection". The latter concern the coast of Sardinia.
The state trick
It is here that we begin to make explicit the "trick" of the state. The concept is hidden by the subterfuges, but it is clear in substance, starting from the south of the island. For Portovesme, it is planned to build a floating offshore platform to position a "Regasification Unit" on the coast suitable for serving the Southern Industrial and thermoelectric segment, as well as the consumption basin of the metropolitan city of Cagliari. In reality, however, there is nowhere written that the connection networks between the sea terminal, the industrial activities and the metropolitan city of Cagliari must be built. Not really a marginal step, on the contrary. This is the heart of the problem: gas will have a single national tariff "up to" the sea terminal, then, however, the works that must be carried out to transport it will be borne by the operator who, then, will amortize them by unloading them on the bills of the end users of Sardinia.
You pay more
It is clear that the Sardinians, if this solution is ever implemented, will pay much more for natural gas than any other Italian and European reality, precisely because the depreciation of those works will be limited to the single basin of Sardinia. The attempt to omit this step is all linked to the need to somehow mitigate the only real objective of the decree: to snatch the wind and the sun of Sardinia. That no state intervention is envisaged to reduce the energy gap in terms of natural gas is sanctioned upstream, in the 2020 law, when some flag amendments were presented to the Chamber and the Senate which envisaged extending the single national price of gas to all of Sardinia, and, therefore, not only "up" to the coast. Amendments withdrawn and rejected, meaning that no one wanted to bear the infrastructure costs of the island. Costs that, in that case, should have been shared on a national scale, in full compliance with a sacrosanct principle of rebalancing and cohesion. They didn't want to hear about it. They preferred to exclusively satisfy the national gas lobbies, cutting costs only for transport from Tuscany to the Sardinian coast, not caring about what would have happened in Sardinia, both in terms of construction of the networks, not contemplated in the "virtual" connection, than in terms of the cost of gas at the mouth of the stove.
Deliberately confused
A provision that awaits the autograph of Draghi which appears, perhaps deliberately, confused precisely in the definition of the hypothetical connections between the coast and the various urban realities. An example is enough: the decree provides that the coastal terminals of Portovesme, Oristano and Porto Torres "are connected through sections of the network with the main industrial consumption basins and, possibly, to the areas that will be affected by the construction of gas-fired thermoelectric plants. ". Sections of "pipe" that will not in any way fall within the costs of the "virtual connection" and, therefore, will not "enjoy" the comparison of costs with respect to those envisaged for the rest of the country. Added to this is the "possible" connection with gas-fired thermoelectric plants to be built. We are faced with real fantasies: the decree, in fact, provides that the thermoelectric plants, the coal-fired ones of Porto Torres and Portovesme, will be closed, without a blow, by 2025. And it is no coincidence that Sardinia, by decision of Rome, Terna, Enel and various lobbies, is the only Region that will not convert the central ones to gas. To hypothesize the supply and distribution networks, again without guaranteeing a gas cost on par with the rest of the country, it is necessary to arrive at paragraph 5 of article two. Here is the regulatory masterpiece: the terminals are "possibly" connected "where possible according to the cost / benefit analysis carried out in the design" to the distribution networks built or on site.
Only mugging
For the snatch of sun and wind absolute certainties, electric cable-leash ready for construction, for the connection of gas to the houses of the Sardinians, however, it will be necessary to wait for the evaluation of the "costs / benefits". As if to say: if it is not convenient to make those connections, be patient you will run out of gas. Moreover, this "hypothesis", therefore not a certainty, is reserved only for the areas of Sulcis, Cagliari, Oristano and Sassari. For the capital of Sardinia an even more uncertain variable is added with "the possible inclusion in the virtual connection of a regasification plant in the port of Cagliari". A hypothesis contemplated in the Draghi decree that allows us to understand the confusion with which the government is dealing with the Sardinia case.
The mess of Cagliari
Providing in the same provision the connection, with a mini backbone, between Portovesme and Cagliari and, at the same time, hypothesizing the construction of a regasification plant in the Port of Cagliari is simply beyond any logic. It is clear, in fact, that, if the regasification terminal were built in Cagliari, the connection backbone with Portovesme would be completely uneconomical. A large part of Sardinia remains out of this decree, with entire provinces totally excluded even from any "hypothesis" of connection. From the government they let it be known that an economy of gas transport by road will be activated. In practice, we will use what technically are called "tank wagons", or tanks that will travel loaded with gas in the most disparate and unsafe arteries of the island. The Draghi energy revolution will have no equal: for Sardinia only barges, carribombolai and virtual connections. For the rest it will be an avalanche of business, all to be consumed on the remains of the Nuraghi Island.
