Over 20 meetings with local populations and 300 with Municipalities, Provinces and Regions. This is the balance with which Terna closes 2018 and prepares to continue and consolidate in 2019 the turning point undertaken for some time but strongly accelerated last year: that of meetings with the territories. The key word is always that, sustainability and the sharing, by local populations, of the interventions to create new and better infrastructures. Born as a project, "Terna meets" has become a real protocol for the operator of the national electricity transmission grid: launched with the aim of encouraging dialogue between the company and the local communities to facilitate the implementation of the grid development plan, it is now an inseparable part of the investment plan.
The reasons for this sustainable approach are clear. The cycle of meetings on the territory allows the network manager to deal directly with those who live within the areas intended to house the infrastructures, illustrating the projects for new works or the rearrangement of existing ones and welcoming opinions and suggestions from the inhabitants in compliance with environmental and landscape constraints. In fact, we must not forget that the group invested 1 billion in 2017 and expects to spend another 5,3 billion in the period 2018-2022. 70% of new investments are intended to improve interconnections, the quality of service and reduce the environmental impact (focusing more and more on underground networks).
For projects recognized at Community level, which contribute to the integration of energy markets, the public consultation process is a mandatory practice based on European Regulation no. 347/2013 which defines the Projects of common interest (Pic), ie those initiatives that have significant positive effects on at least two member states and which contribute to the integration of electricity markets and to greater competition within the perimeter of the Union.
In Italy, consultation is not mandatory but it is highly desirable to overcome the mistrust and fears, sometimes even legitimate, of those who live on the spot and have to deal with the construction of infrastructures: in France this model has allowed the various governments to build over time 58 nuclear power plants scattered throughout the area and accepted by those who live there. From Tuscany to Sardinia, from Puglia to Campania where the construction of the second submarine cable which will connect Capri with Sorrento, during 2018 Terna had - as mentioned - over 20 meetings organized with citizens and around 300 with Municipalities, Provinces and Regions involved in development projects on the national electricity grid.
The latest in chronological order, a few days before the Christmas holidays, took place in Auronzo di Cadore, in the Veneto province of Belluno. The concertation project with local authorities can be considered the first "experiment" in participatory planning and started long ago, when in 2016 the Veneto region and Terna started discussions with the municipalities of Auronzo and Cortina and which saw the involvement of the inhabitants right from the first phase of project definition. Indeed, the first contact between Terna and the Veneto region dates back to 2014 when together they conducted a series of site inspections to verify some alternative routes for the 132 kV power line.
The reorganization of the network in the upper Belluno area it is useful because the national electricity transmission grid in the upper Belluno area is characterized by a low level of interconnection. But it is also crucial if you think of the beauty of the area in which it is located: the splendid Alpine chain of the Dolomites. The project provides for an improvement solution for the benefit of the municipality and which will improve the continuity of the energy transmission service through the construction of a new underground cable connection approximately 23 km long between the Municipality of Cortina d'Ampezzo and the Municipality of Auronzo. Furthermore, the construction of a new 132/220 kV electrical station covering 1,5 hectares in Auronzo, in the locality of Cima Gogna, which will make it possible to interconnect the existing lines and connect them to the one that today starts from Lienz (Austria) and heads towards the lower Veneto but without introducing energy into the electricity grid of the upper Belluno area.
