• Smart working saves 600 kg of CO2 per year per worker, according to Enea.
• Transport is responsible for 25 per cent of total emissions in Italy.
• Under the Milleproroghe decree, agile working has been extended until 30 June.

If working one fewer day is good for a person's health (and does not affect company productivity), smart working is good for the health of the entire planet. At a time when the United Kingdom is calculating the (wholly positive) effects of a four-day working week instead of five, another study with results that are as intuitive as they are significant has been published in Italy.

For instance, it has been set down in black and white that remote working makes it possible to avoid the emission of approximately 600 kilograms of CO2 per year, per worker (a reduction of 40 per cent), with considerable savings in terms of:

• time (approximately 150 hours);
• distance travelled (3,500 kilometres);
• fuel (260 litres of petrol or 237 litres of diesel).

The study on the environmental impact of smart working was carried out by Enea, the national agency for new technologies, energy and sustainable economic development, across four sample cities (Rome, Turin, Bologna and Trento) over the four-year period 2015–2018, and has been published in the international journal Applied Sciences.

666 cars per 1,000 inhabitants in Italy

In a country like Italy, which ranks second in Europe behind Luxembourg with 666 cars per thousand inhabitants, transport is responsible for over 25 per cent of total national greenhouse gas emissions, and almost all of them (as much as 93 per cent) come from road transport, with private cars in the lead. "Agile working and all other forms of remote working, including smart working, have shown that they can be an important instrument of change capable of improving professional and personal quality of life, as well as reducing urban traffic and pollution and revitalising entire peripheral areas and dormitory neighbourhoods," explains Roberta Roberto, researcher in Enea's Department of Energy Technologies and Renewable Sources and co-author of the study.

ENEA @ENEAOfficial

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#smartworking #ambiente
Lo studio @ENEAOfficial su un campione di lavoratori pubblici a #Roma, #Torino, #Bologna e #Trento evidenzia il 40% in meno di #emissioni procapite all’anno e notevoli risparmi in termini di tempo, distanza percorsa e carburante.

👉media.enea.it/comunicati-e-n…

♥ 6 23 feb 2023 · Apri su X →

Enea analysed a sample of 1,269 workers from the public administration in the four cities under examination, who worked in smart working one or two days a week and who, on in-person working days, used private internal combustion vehicles; by simulating their home-to-work commutes, it found that each day of remote working makes it possible to avoid 6 kilograms of CO2 entering the atmosphere and to save 85 megajoules (MJ) of fuel per capita.

Between wellbeing and pollution

But the environmental benefits do not stop there: the analysis also highlighted a reduction in nitrogen oxides per person per day (from 14.8 grams in Trento to 7.9 grams in Turin), carbon monoxide (from 38.9 grams in Rome to 18.7 grams in Trento) and fine particulate matter such as PM10 (from 1.6 g in Rome to 0.9 g in Turin) and PM2.5 (from 1.1 g in Rome and Trento to 0.6 g in Turin).

Evidently, breaking the habit of using the car to get to work also "sets in motion" virtuous behaviours in leisure time: for non-work-related journeys on smart working days, 24.8 per cent of the sample declared that they had opted for more sustainable modes (public transport, walking or cycling), while 8.7 per cent had changed their choices in favour of the private car. Although there is still a sizeable 66 per cent that has not yet changed its mobility options.

Studio Donati @StudioDonati

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Pubblicata in #GU la L. 14/2023 che converte il Decreto #Milleproroghe. Diverse novità previste in materia giuslavoristica:
👉 #SMARTWORKING #LAVORATORI #FRAGILI
👉#SMARTWORKING #LAVORATORI #GENITORI CON #FIGLI UNDER 14
👉#fondonuovecompetenze

♥ 1💬 1 28 feb 2023 · Apri su X →

The data collected show that on average the sample travels 35 kilometres per day over a duration of 1 hour and 20 minutes (at an average speed of below 30 kilometres per hour). Rome confirms itself as the most critical city, with an average journey time of 2 hours, probably due to the greater distances involved (one in five Roman workers travels more than 100 kilometres a day) and heavier traffic. Indeed, in the capital, daily journeys for work and study purposes amount to approximately 420,000, while each person spends 82 hours a year in traffic.

After the forced discovery of smart working in Italy during the pandemic, the situation is unfortunately slowly returning to the previous normality of in-person work: beyond private agreements between employees and employers, the parliament recently extended smart working under the Milleproroghe decree for vulnerable workers until 30 June, both in the private sector (where it will also apply to workers with children up to 14 years of age) and in the public sector, thanks to an allocation of 16 million euros aimed at enabling home working even for those performing essential functions, who will be moved to other duties and replaced by other workers.