With the same energy savings obtained, encouraging energy efficiency in industry costs much less than focusing above all – as we tend to do today – on residential construction. This is revealed by the CESEF 2019 Report of Agici Finanza d'Impresa, which quantifies in 82,5 billion the cost of housing eco-bonuses, which the latest policy guidelines seem to favor, against i 6,8 billion for white certificates, with the same result obtainable.
“The institutions – explained Stefano Clerici of CESEF – to achieve the 2030 decarbonisation objectives indicated by the National Energy and Climate Plan (Pniec), have introduced new measures and redirected resources from industrial to residential. As far as white certificates are concerned, they are currently the measure that is most penalized by the new 2030 planning: a choice that is not justified by the results that can be obtained”.
The conviction therefore prevails that the building sector hides a great potential for energy efficiency that is still untapped, while in industry there is little margin for efficiency. But according to CESEF this is not the case e Energy efficiency potential remains high in all sectors: industry, residential, transport and public administration. And above all the related costs for the State are not comparable.
In fact, by examining the impacts of measures and investments envisaged by the Pniec, white certificates in industry generate savings of 15 million tons of oil equivalent (Mtoe), investments of 13,7 billion euros with a cost to the State of 6,83 billion, while the restructuring eco-bonus, against investments of 82,5 billion, generates savings of 18 Mtoe and costs the State 45 billion.
In other words, to save a ton of oil equivalent, the State provides incentives with 455 euros for white certificates and 2.500 euros for building renovations. It therefore turns out that TEEs have a decidedly more favorable cost-effectiveness (€/toe).. To achieve the new objectives indicated by the Pniec, the tax incentive measures in the residential sector will therefore have to generate 35% of energy savings by 2030, confirming the growth trend seen since 2015, while a progressive reduction of the share is envisaged of savings to be obtained with TEEs: from 63% in the first formulation of 2014 to only 29% in the Pniec.
This shift towards tax measures for redevelopment necessarily translates into a shift of public resources and the focus of operators from industry to residential. And the regulatory changes introduced with the 2018 Budget law for deductions are already showing the first effects: this incentive in fact, it exceeded the TEE for the first time in terms of savings generated reaching 1,58 Mtoe in 2018.
It is therefore assisting a sort of competition for public resources between the industrial sector and the residential sector. The measures, which should be complementary and favor an organic development of the supply chains in each sector, risk creating imbalances in the market. Many operators are equipping themselves with the necessary skills to intervene in the residential sector, taking advantage of the new regulations.
Others, above all the energy service companies (ESCo, the Energy Service Company), able to provide all the technical, commercial and financial services necessary to carry out an energy efficiency intervention, they still believe in the potential of the industrial sector, but are increasingly struggling to convince industry to invest.
By redirecting public resources towards the residential sector, it was also held – again according to CESEF – in little consideration the wide range of possible interventions on the industrial process. Unlike the interventions on ancillary activities, which have much smaller average dimensions, the projects that intervene on the production process are characterized by greater potential risks, by the interruption of production for a certain period, by huge investments. For these reasons, entrepreneurs hardly accept to carry out interventions to improve the efficiency of the production process.
By making tax incentives for industry certain and stable, the Pniec objective of 0,7 Mtoe/year of industrial efficiency is undersized compared to the real potential. Based on two scenarios (Conservative and Best) elaborated by CESEF 2019, in the next ten years the still possible efficiency appears to be greater than the indications of the Pniec: in the first case 4,5 Mtoe/year, in the second 6 Mtoe/year.
However, it is necessary to exploit this untapped potential restart those interventions on technologies which in the past have generated the greatest energy savings: heat recovery, re-engineering of production processes, free cooling systems, production of thermal energy from renewable sources.
