If two Presidents of the largest Italian banks are discussing planetary climate change, putting on the table the primary need to find resources to achieve the objectives of the climate conferences, it really means that the goal is at risk. The money must be found quickly, reopening tables and multi-level comparisons. Fabrizio Saccomanni, president of Unicredit and Francesco Profumo President of Compagnia San Paolo they went to the IAI (Institute of International Affairs) to discuss the political, economic and social transformations brought about by climate change. The Roman think tank has organized a discussion with the Harvard Kennedy School on issues as complex as they are challenging. With them also Lapo Pistelli, Director of International Relations of Eni, with the task of explaining, raising awareness, the actors of transversal processes that affect people's lives, geopolitical relations and, certainly not least, the world energy market.
Italian finance has accepted the challenge of climate change, but there is also awareness that financial institutions must make rapid progress with adequate tools and procedures. It is a fact that multinationals need money to support the transformation of production processes. The delays that have accumulated here and there are all attributable to this essential economic matrix. In the last two years, Italy has partially supported the innovative challenges, leaving the true weight of innovation to the competition between companies. Carlo Calenda's Industry 4.0 project has contributed with rebates and concessions. It is not clear what the incumbent government will actually do, which has set forth many good intentions compared to the few public resources available. In terms of energy and the environment, awareness of interventions has increased significantly, says Saccomanni. It is positive that the 20 G2015 set up a specific task force with the task of defining a framework of shared rules. But we are on our way. What's really holding you back? The changes in the political structure of the EU, the political guidelines of the States, Brexit, the partially failed carbon tax. A series of factors, in short, which according to Francesco Profumo affect the budget and the strength of the Union. Towards industrial decarbonisation, the tax on fossil fuels at the start was to raise between 70 and 100 billion a year. A good starting point, watered down according to Profumo, once the law ended up in the final document of the Commission which set the levy at just 10 billion.
Access to energy will have to be guaranteed for many years, however, and there's no need to beat your chest just for renewables. The EU recently revised its climate guidelines, but according to Lapo Pistelli, 65% of the C02 quota that can be emitted into the atmosphere has already been consumed before bringing down the risk threshold of 2°C. We are not doing well at all. A well-founded criticism at this point is directed towards all those who discuss exclusively renewable sources. The energy transition is still long and along the way fossil fuels will remain a very large slice of the world energy pie. Gas, investments in refining, Trump-driven US policies are the paradigm within which we must necessarily work. And above all to understand that traditional energies have not disappeared and will not disappear, at least for the next 30-50 years. Oil and gas companies are making business more sustainable. Eni itself (the CEO Claudio Descalzi also recalled this recently) is trying to bring all emissions related to the refining of crude oil to zero. Beware that we risk the game of the goose, all of Europe can return to the starting point, that is, to the goals of the UN climate conferences. In order not to have to restart and not agree with everyone on everything, with an ideal energy system, as apostles of environmentalism, resources and widespread conviction are needed. Governments need to lend a hand.
