It is now official: for Italy, sustainable nuclear energy exists. Or at least it will be able to exist in the future. Long anticipated for several months, the Council of Ministers has approved the bill introducing so-called sustainable, or next-generation, nuclear energy — as well as the future prospect based on nuclear fusion — into Italy's energy mix. The proposal, presented by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Minister of the Environment and Energy Security Gilberto Pichetto Fratin, aims to integrate next-generation nuclear energy and fusion within national energy policies, in line with the decarbonisation target set for 2050.

Gilberto Pichetto @GPichetto

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Abbiamo due obiettivi da centrare contemporaneamente: fornire l'energia necessaria a famiglie e imprese e decarbonizzare, raggiungendo entro il 2050 l'obiettivo zero emissioni.

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According to Minister Pichetto Fratin, in his own words, "with next-generation nuclear energy, alongside renewables, we will be able to achieve decarbonisation targets while guaranteeing the country's full energy security. Italy is thus ready to face the challenges of the future." The Italian government is, in short, convinced that so-called sustainable nuclear energy will help meet the growing demand for electricity and strengthen Italy's energy independence, while also reducing CO2 emissions and keeping energy costs down for citizens and businesses. In terms of figures, the hypothesis is to reach the Net Zero 2050 target with a share of between 11 and 22 per cent of total energy produced through nuclear power, with the remaining share generated from renewable sources. But will it actually work out that way?

Will sustainable nuclear energy truly be sustainable?

The new nuclear power will need to differ markedly from the plants of the past, which are destined for decommissioning. As already announced in recent months, small modular reactors (SMRs) will be adopted, including privately owned ones, and an independent nuclear safety authority could be established, tasked with regulating and monitoring Italian nuclear infrastructure. The bill sets out a comprehensive regulatory framework for the entire nuclear energy lifecycle, from experimentation to plant design and authorisation, through to management and decommissioning. Particular attention, it is assured, will also be paid to the storage and disposal of radioactive waste, with the aim of guaranteeing the highest safety standards.

Promoters of nuclear projects — which, as mentioned, may be private companies — will be required to demonstrate that they can cover the costs of construction, operation and decommissioning of plants, as well as any risks associated with nuclear activity. Furthermore, the delegation provides for close collaboration with electricity grid operators, in order to assess the impact of the new nuclear policy on the national electricity market. Over the next 12 months, the government will be called upon to adopt a series of legislative decrees to implement the outlined strategy. The national plan will include the testing, siting and construction of new reactors, as well as the management of nuclear fuel within a circular economy framework. Incentives are also envisaged for the territories that will host nuclear infrastructure, in order to guarantee economic and employment benefits for local communities.

So is everything fine? Not exactly. For a start, there will be local resistance to overcome — otherwise there would be no need for incentives to host the infrastructure. Which, for that matter, will not be quite as small as is claimed: small in size, yes, but not tiny, since Pichetto himself ventured a comparison just a few months ago during a parliamentary hearing: "The entire SMR installation, not just the small reactor itself, can have the dimensions of a shopping centre and at the same time provide constant electrical power to more than 500,000 people."

Furthermore, before the Chamber's Environment and Productive Activities committees, Enel spoke of a target of 70–110 euros per MWh once the supply chain is fully operational. But the specialist publication Qualenergia points out that solar photovoltaic with battery storage already costs less today.

We don't know how to manage decommissioning

Few people seem to be asking the question, but how will future nuclear power plants be decommissioned? It is hard to say, given that we still do not fully know how to manage the ones already shut down. The unresolved issue with regard to old power plants remains the storage of nuclear waste: to date, no suitable site has yet been identified for it. In the meantime, decommissioning timelines are stretching out. According to new estimates from Sogin, the public company responsible for decommissioning, operations will continue at least until 2052, an 11-year delay compared to previous official forecasts, with costs increasing by nearly 4 billion euros. Furthermore, the commissioning of the national repository for radioactive waste, originally scheduled for 2029, has now been pushed back to 2039, postponing the completion of the infrastructure by a decade. As a result, the "green-field" milestone — the return of sites to the community after remediation — will no longer be reached in 2041, as estimated in 2020, but in 2052.

Statements made by Sogin's chief executive Gian Luca Artizzu to Il Sole24Ore on 12 February confirm an even more costly reality: the overall cost of nuclear decommissioning has more than doubled. While Italy has already spent approximately 5 billion euros to date, new estimates indicate that the total figure will rise to 11.38 billion, compared to the 7.8 billion projected in the previous plan. It has been a steady escalation: in 2013 the cost was estimated at 6.6 billion, rising to 7.2 billion in 2017 and 7.8 billion in 2020. The cost increase announced by Artizzu (+3.6 billion) is equivalent to roughly one-sixth of the entire 2025 budget law approved by the Italian Parliament last December.

And the bill could rise even further. Artizzu himself underlined that inflation and rising material costs — factors typical of the public works market, often compounded by construction delays — could cause costs to balloon even more.