There are no drills in our seas and there won't be any more. Instead, there are 64 platforms that are operational, 59 of which are located in the Upper Adriatic, while in Puglia, Basilicata, Campania, Sardinia and Liguria, which also promoted the Referendum, there are none.
These platforms supply us, every day, with a part of the methane gas we need for our domestic and industrial uses (50% of national gas production, the equivalent of 2,5 million TOE, for a value of about 1,5 billion euros). This activity employs 6.700 people in Ravenna alone (11 direct and 20 indirect throughout Italy). On this basis, considered insignificant by the promoters of the referendum, the "Italian kitten", as Enrico Mattei called it, has built a system of companies that is among the most advanced and qualified in the world.
The companies that built the Goliath platform in the North Sea on behalf of the "very green" Norway are Italian, and the ones that will build the platforms off the coast of Egypt will be Italian. If the Si were to pass, within 2/4 years, we would have to close 2/3 of our platforms, even if the deposits they insist on were not completely exhausted. The economic and employment consequences of this decision are easy to understand.
Does such a decision make sense? No, it hasn't. Are there any risks to the environment, safety, tourism or fishing that can justify it? Absolutely not. The platforms cannot pollute because their activity (extraction and waste disposal) never comes into contact with water: nothing is discharged into the sea. For this reason they have become oases for restocking fish (the fishermen of Ravenna collect mussels which are the best and most expensive in the Adriatic) and for this reason the European Community has awarded the coasts of Romagna 9 blue flags. Last year the number of tourists exceeded 25 million.
Safety is also more than guaranteed. The control by the competent authorities (at least 6) is daily and absolutely punctual. But perhaps the best confirmation comes from the insurance companies which, in their annual classification of the sectors at greatest risk (number of accidents per thousand employees), place Oil and Gas in last place. Only school is better!
But, it is said, gas limits the use of renewable energies and subtracts their resources. Nothing less true. Gas is not competitive but complementary to renewable sources. They satisfy different needs but both of these sources, together with energy savings and efficiency, can help Italy in the energy transition phase in which we are committed and which presupposes the maximum possible reduction in the use of coal and oil in energy production electric. Giving up gas would not benefit renewable sources, it would only increase imports.
Furthermore, gas is self-sufficient, it does not need subsidies to be extracted and consumed. It generates income from which the government can derive part of the taxes it needs to subsidize renewable sources which are not yet self-sufficient (12 billion euros a year).
This referendum does not help the country to pursue a new energy policy, it does not create new spaces for renewable sources, it does not create jobs but destroys them. It does not prepare a new development but takes us a step back. Nor does it resolve the conflict of competences between the State and the regions in the field of energy, but it also aggravates it because it is not the right instrument to resolve this issue.
The right tool will be the institutional referendum scheduled for October. On that occasion, citizens will say whether to decide on energy matters (as well as on matters of security or foreign policy) should be the Parliament, which all represents us, or whether it should be the Regions. For us it must be the Parliament and, on that occasion, we will go to vote and we will vote YES. But for this referendum which is confusing, wrong and harmful we say NO. And the absolute best way to say No is to NOT GO TO VOTE so as not to contribute, even indirectly, to its success.
