15 years ago, the Italian Prime, the late Minister Silvio Berlusconi, threatened to build a massive nuclear energy industry in the face of high oil prices.
“We will need a massive building programme of nuclear power reactors,” the brash PM said at the time.
“It is an emergency situation that we find ourselves in today, and I think that wielding this threat should bring a fall in the price of oil,” Berlusconi said.
Now, in 2023, with Europe in the midst of a fresh energy crisis and the threat of runaway global warming at the front door, Italy is again thinking about nuclear.
The country ended up shutting its last nuclear power plants by 2016. The country has had two referendums on banning nuclear energy, in the 1980s and again in 2011.
Today, the government is thinking about nuclear once more. This time a plan announced by the new minister of environment, Gilberto Pichetto Fratin, hopes to kickstart nuclear once again.
The Journal Nature reports a working group of top scientists, politicians, and commercial and civic leaders will come together to discuss starting again.
There are going to be many challenges to ensuring Italy can become a nuclear-focused economy in future.
“Building a [state-of-the-art] plant requires seven to ten years”, said Alessandro Dodaro, director of the nuclear department of ENEA. “But in a country without presence and acceptance of nuclear power, you need at least five years more to inform people and make them understand the advantages.”.
Despite the industry having almost completely shut down, Italy still maintains strong skills and local knowledge required to restart the industry.
According to Ezio Previtali, director of the Gran Sasso National Laboratories, who has been invited to the September meeting to represent the National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN). “Many companies have continued to work for foreign clients after Italy left its programme, and technical universities have continued to educate nuclear engineers,” he says.
