The world of energy and the research one are two sectors that have talked to each another, in the past, in a singular and frequently univocal way. During the decades preceding the oil shock of 1973, in fact, the long-term objective of most energetic research was the substitution of most energy consumptions with the nuclear energy.
The optimism linked to the atom world lasted for a short time, till the Chernobyl disaster of 1986, which put an end to an energetic "spinneret", sins of which found out the previous years. The problem of the stations localization, the dislocation of the wastes one and the nuclear proliferation for war goals, that is still a problem, were and are nowadays three unsolved aspects of the problem.
Today, the pro-nuclear lobbies would solve this through a decree, in order to carry back our Country to the wake of the estimated "modernity". The energetic modernity, nowadays, is measured through the innovation degree and the capacity to adapt itself, in a flexible way, to the rapidly changing scenarios.
The growing exploitation of the fossil sources, certainly cleaner than yesterday but always dirt in the CO₂ front, the nostalgia for the nuclear and the fundamental choice of the centralized models of production dont represent innovation but withdrawal.
The scientific models, and the economic ones, can represent an example. The collaborative systems, distributed, decentralized and integrated in the network are becoming more efficient and competitive in different sectors of the human activity but has some difficulty in afferming themself in the energetic field.
This is due to the facts that, in the energetic field, the cultures are too sectorial and only for a short time the interdisciplinarity is operative in this field. The energetic panoramas are, in fact, not much permeated by themes as the sustenability and the environmental protection that have some difficulty in finding a real inward nationality. The main incentives for the development of thematics as the energetic efficiency and the alternative sources, are and persist fundamentally the short-term economic ones. This is due, on the one hand, to the isolation of the energetic world from the other main thematics that have been on the agenda during these years and, on the other hand, to the will to deal with the energetic problems using tools and visions of short-term.
Myopic choices are at stake, of short weight and limited. The energy price, in fact, is growing in the world and while it seems incredible an oil barrel price of 55 dollars from an observatory, not ambientalist, as the Goldman Sachs's one, arrives the notice of a possible oil barrel price of 105 dollars in a short time.
Meantime the CO₂ price is growing too. This shows that a portion of the econmic world is conscious of the fact that the environmental costs would must, willing or unwilling, been included into the productive processes.
So, the question at stake isn't if we'll arrive to these costs, but how much we would pay them regarding when they will been considered. The ambientalists like us, conscious of the fact that not only economic costs but environmental and, above all, social ones will be at stake, press so that this accountancy starts from today, in order to avoid an exponential growth tomorrow. This is of weight, above all, for our Country.


Elio Pacilio
Green Cross Italia Vice - President

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