Road to 2050. Europe at almost the halfway point.

Europe's goal is to achieve ‘net zero’ greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Each country has given itself a timeline with intermediate steps. The first, quite close, is 2030. Is the Old Continent ready to become a modern, resource-efficient and competitive economy?

The European Green Deal is Europe's great challenge to become the first climate-neutral continent. If 2050 is the year in which net greenhouse gas emissions must be reduced to zero, 2030 is a real milestone: the percentage of emissions must fall by 55% compared to 1990 levels.

But the approach of different countries is different: how to reach the 2050 target is not the same for all. For 19 countries the intermediate targets are spelled out in a law. For others they are enshrined in political programmes, while still others have made a simple declaration of intent.

Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU), Data-Driven EnviroLab (DDL), NewClimate Institute and the University of Oxford collected data on the Net Zero Tracker site to easily visualise the commitments of various countries (not only European) in terms of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Figure 1 shows the map with the percentage of emissions that different countries commit to reduce by 2030. Most European countries have declared that they intend to reduce emissions by at least 40% by 2030. This is also the case for Italy with 43.7%. Norway will reduce them by 55%. The most ambitious plan is Finland's, which aims (by law) to reduce emissions by 60% by 2030 and become ‘carbon neutral’ by 2035. Denmark and Sweden by 2045.

Figura 1: target di diminuzione delle emissioni di gas effetto serra in Europa (%) entro il 2030.

Italy

The Piano Nazionale Integrato per l'Energia e il Clima 2030 (PNIEC) (Integrated National Energy and Climate Plan 2030) is the fundamental tool that outlines the guidelines for the decarbonisation of Italy. The latest version, sent to the European Commission on 1 July, confirms the objectives set in June 2023, and exceeds, especially on renewable energies, the targets already announced.
For Renewable Energy Sources (RES), the government's commitment is that Italy will have to reach a renewable energy capacity of 131 Gigawatts by 2030. It is expected that 79.2% will come from solar.
As far as greenhouse gas emissions and removals are concerned, Italy plans to exceed the ‘FitFor55’ target for industrial plants bound by ETS (Emissions Trading System) regulations, reaching -66% compared to 2005 levels (EU target, -62%).
For the ‘non-ETS’ sectors (civil, transport and agriculture), although there has been a substantial improvement in emission indicators, more effort will be needed to reach the European targets.