Italy: country profile

01Overview

Italy enters 2027 having cut its greenhouse-gas emissions to 363 Mt CO₂e in 2024, 3.6% below 2023 and 30% below 1990, but with transport emissions still above their 1990 level and the 2030 effort-sharing target out of reach on current policies [1] [3]. Renewables met 41.2% of electricity demand in 2024 [7], and Russian gas fell from about 40% of imports in 2021 to under 5% by 2023 [8]. 2024 was the warmest year in the national record [21]; Italy recorded 18,010 heat-related deaths in the summer of 2022, more than any other European country [4]. About 94% of municipalities are exposed to landslides, floods or coastal erosion [11]; the May 2023 floods in Emilia-Romagna caused damage of about €8.5 billion [14]; and 40% of buildings stand in zones of medium to high seismic hazard, yet only 7.3% of homes are insured against earthquake and flood [13]. This Baseline Edition fixes the reference state for the five core systems, maps the dependencies through which shocks travel, and sets the questions the first operational edition will answer in Q1 2027. It ranks nothing and decides nothing.

02At a glance

population, 1 January 2025

58.9 million

emissions, 2024

363 Mt CO₂e

renewables in electricity demand, 2024

41.2 %

heat-related, summer 2022

18,010 deaths

municipalities exposed to hydrogeological hazard

≈94 %

water lost in networks, 2022

42.4 %

03Key findings

04Domain reading

Each of the twelve coupled domains is read in words, not scored. The coupling column names the dependency that carries risk into other systems.

05Sector screen

All sixteen sectors are screened on the same grammar, so that later editions can say what changed. The evidence column describes coverage of the baseline evidence, not the performance of the sector.

06System couplings

The Italy matrix types the twenty couplings between the five core systems. Strengths are Nexus estimates from the cited evidence and analogue events; they set the starting graph that the Q1 2027 Foundry cut will test.

07Risk objects

Four risk objects open the portfolio. Order carries no rank. Each is read across driver, exposure, vulnerability, capacity, cascade and consequence.

• Extreme heat

  Reported EQL 4

  Driver

  heatwaves and tropical nights

  Exposure

  older people; dense cities

  Vulnerability

  one of Europe’s oldest populations; housing without cooling

  Capacity

  heat-health alert system; summer plans

  Cascade

  CLI → HLT · CLI → ENE

  Horizon

  seasonal

• Drought in the Po basin and the South

  Reported EQL 4

  Driver

  dry winters; low Alpine snowpack; hot summers

  Exposure

  irrigation, hydropower, drinking water

  Vulnerability

  network losses of 42.4% [12]

  Capacity

  basin water-severity observatories [24]

  Cascade

  WAT → FOO, ENE, HLT

  Horizon

  seasonal · 5 years

• Floods and landslides

  Reported EQL 4

  Driver

  cloudbursts; autumn storms

  Exposure

  6.8 million in medium flood hazard; 1.3 million in high landslide hazard [11]

  Vulnerability

  building on unstable slopes and floodplains

  Capacity

  regional alert centres; civil protection

  Cascade

  CLI → WAT → INF, HLT, FIN

  Horizon

  annual

• Earthquakes and volcanic unrest

  Reported EQL 4

  Driver

  active faults; Campi Flegrei uplift [16]

  Exposure

  about 40% of buildings in medium-high seismic zones [13]

  Vulnerability

  older building stock; dense settlement

  Capacity

  seismic monitoring; civil protection; evacuation plans

  Cascade

  GEO → INF, HLT, FIN

  Horizon

  any time

08Capability ladder

Existence is not readiness. Each of the fifteen capability functions is placed on the ladder by the strongest public evidence at baseline.

09Scenario

Drought-to-flood year. A conditional statement under stated assumptions, never a prediction.

10Lenses

The baseline is read through each steward’s lens, then once as a whole. Each lens is a projection of reviewed findings, not a separate argument.

• Technical Truth

  GCRI · KEY T

  The evidence supports a coupled reading of Italian risk. Heat, drought, cloudbursts, landslides and earthquakes are already recorded, and their losses fall mostly outside insurance. Evidence is strongest for emissions, heat mortality and hydrogeological exposure, and weakest for cross-system dependencies.

• Public Meaning

  GRF · KEY M

  For most people risk arrives as a heatwave, a flooded street or a crack after an earthquake. The baseline asks that these be read as one system, and that public debate weigh who carries the losses when fewer than one home in ten is insured.

• Capital Meaning

  GRA · KEY F

  Readiness implications only. Very low insurance take-up [13], a new business insurance mandate [10] and an effort-sharing gap [3] show where finance-readiness evidence will matter. Nothing here is advice, a rating or an approval.

• Synthesis

  NEXUS

  Italy observes its hazards well, its seismic and volcanic monitoring is among the strongest anywhere, but its territory, buildings and networks carry deep exposure that is mostly uninsured. The 2027 programme should test the drought-to-flood year, map hydrogeological exposure and measure who carries the losses.

11Portfolio

Five initiatives and one Universe mission candidate are proposed for admission at the Q1 2027 alignment. They are programme objects, no partner, funder or member is attached to them in this edition.

122027 agenda

Eight bounded questions open the 2027 National Agenda. Each comes from a baseline finding, names the initiative that will carry it and the first output due at the Q1 2027 cut.

1. A-01

   How would a drought-to-flood year travel through agriculture, hydropower, health and slopes, a hot, dry summer on the Po followed by autumn cloudbursts on dried soils?

   INI-ITA-DFL-01 · drought-to-flood year

2. A-02

   Which homes, schools and lifelines sit in high flood and landslide hazard areas, municipality by municipality?

   INI-ITA-HGR-02 · hydrogeological exposure

3. A-03

   Where does the uninsured share of earthquake, flood and landslide losses land, and how would wider cover change it?

   INI-ITA-FIN-03 · protection gap and fiscal backstop

4. A-04

   How prepared are the communities around the Campi Flegrei for a further escalation of unrest?

   INI-ITA-GEO-04 · seismic and volcanic readiness

5. A-05

   What heat surge capacity exists for older people at home and in care in the largest cities?

   INI-ITA-HLT-05 · heat surge readiness

6. A-06

   How much drought resilience would cutting network losses and adding storage buy in the South and the islands?

   with GS-01 Water

7. A-07

   How are Xylella, drought and wildfire changing olive groves and Mediterranean ecosystems?

   to be admitted in Q1 2027

8. A-08

   Which capabilities have been tested in real events, and which are only documented?

   national capability register

13Coupled risk, applied response

14Evidence by system

15Sources

40 numbered sources, editor first. Open the reference list and the data appendix.

16Cite, corrections and licence

The full citation, BibTeX and RIS are on the edition page. Corrections go through the gateway and are logged in Annex C. Text is CC BY 4.0.

Cite

Saeed Valadbaygi, Chief Steward and Managing Editor, the Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI) (Ed.). (2026). Italy: country profile. In Italy 2026 [Draft under review]. GCRI for the Nexus Consortium.

Review copy. The DOI is issued at deposit. Text under CC BY 4.0.