The night between Saturday 30 and Sunday 31 October will mark the transition from daylight saving time towinter time. It will be necessary to move the hands of the clock back one hour, gaining an hour of sleep but losing one of light. In any case, in the 7 months of summer time, we saved 450 million kilowatt hours of electricity in Italy, equal to the average annual consumption of around 170 families, with consequent economic savings of around 105 million euros. The financial statements were communicated by Terna, the company that manages the national electricity grid. An extremely positive result especially from an environmental point of view, given that the lower electricity consumption has allowed us to release about 215 tonnes of CO2 less into the atmosphere.
The time change system has been with us for decades now, but things could soon change. After the approval in the summer of 2018 of abolish the obligation to change the time on the part of the European Parliament, the countries belonging to the EU - since April 2021 - have been able to decide whether to keep only one or the other, or whether to continue alternating them.
The proposal had been put forward by a group of Northern European countries, with Poland e Finland driving, where darkness takes up a good part of the days during autumn and winter, however finding the opposition of some States. The position of others, such as Italy, is more contested, given that turning on the lights an hour later allows not indifferent energy and utilities savings, but also a lower environmental impact. According to Terna's analysis, from 2004 to 2021 the lower electricity consumption for Italy due to summer time was around 10,5 billion kWh overall and, in economic terms, resulted in savings for citizens of over 1,8 billion euro. But also from the point of view of health, maintaining summer time would be better, given that all the experts are increasingly in agreement that the changeover constitutes a danger for everyone.
In the meantime, however, the pandemic, the lockdown, a new von der Leyen Commission have arrived and it seems that the issue, at least for the moment, has been set aside.
Returning to Terna's results, as usual, the months in which the energy savings they are april and october. This is due to the fact that the days are shorter in these two months: moving the hands forward by one hour delays the use of artificial light at a time when work activities are still in full swing. On the contrary, in the summer months (such as July and August) the days in terms of natural light are longer and the light bulbs are switched on in the evening hours, when work activities are mostly finished, resulting in less evident results in terms of energy saving. Daylight saving time will be back in effect from March 27, 2022
