The Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security (Mase) accepted the requests presented by the Conference of Regions relating to the decree on areas suitable for renewables.
In the new draft that Mase has sent to the Regions (Sardinia coordinates this dossier), to the ANCI and to the Ministries of Agriculture and Culture, the modification proposals put forward above all by Sardinia are included, in particular on offshore wind energy and the authorization powers of the Regions.
In essence, offshore wind will contribute 100% to the achievement of regional quotas (6.2 gigawatts assigned to the Island), and not just 40% as in the first version. Furthermore, the possibility is foreseen for the Regions to be able to manage the requests made by energy companies and not yet authorized, which in Sardinia number over a thousand. Except for the procedures that had already completed all the authorization processes (less than a dozen on the island in Sardinia).
In the evening, the Environment and Energy technical commission of the Conference of Regions met via videoconference and defined the last point still pending in the draft. A text was approved which establishes that «the surfaces and areas that are included in the perimeter of the assets subject to protection are considered unsuitable (for the installation of renewable energy sources, ed.). In the first draft of the decree, it was written that these areas "may be considered unsuitable". The final draft of the text also establishes that «the Regions can establish a buffer zone from the perimeter of the properties subject to protection of differentiated width depending on the type of plant, proportionate to the property subject to protection, up to a maximum of 7 kilometers». Constraints which, the decree specifies, do not apply to existing systems and their renovations.
In the meantime, in Cagliari, in the Region building, in-depth studies on the draft continue. The councilors for Industry, Emanuele Cani, and for the Environment, Rosanna Laconi, with the president Alessandra Todde and the majority group leaders, are at work for the final evaluations.
Tomorrow morning, in fact, there will be a meeting of the presidents of the Regions in Rome which could already give the definitive green light to the government decree on suitable areas, which has been awaited for over two years. The meeting will be preceded this evening by the Environment and Energy technical commission, led by Sardinia.
(Unioneonline)
