/Report_National_Policy_Forum_Italy

National Policy Forum on Small Hydropower Milan, 15th April 2008, Italy SHERPA - Small Hydro Energy Efficient Promotion Campaign Action (EIE/06/088/SI2.442906 - WP3 – D19) Organized by

Supported by

The Italian National Policy Forum on Small Hydropower took place on the 15th April 2008 in Milan, by FAST Congress Centre.

The event was organized by the Italian Association of Producers from Renewables Energies (APER – Associazione Produttori di energia da fonti Rinnovabili) under Intelligent Energy for Europe program within the framework of the SHERPA project.

More than 120 people attended the Forum. The statistics of the participants is as follows: Hydropower producers - 76, Designers – 15, Public institutions – 12, Researchers – 11, Environmental Associations – 3, Associations of category: 3, Press – 3, Others – 4.

The news of the event was reported by 4 important trade journals. The news items are attached at the end of the report as well as some pictures of the event.

The participants were provided with a folder containing the following documents: -

set of 4 SHP public image folders in Italian (D4 of SHERPA project) report on technical and operational procedures to better integrate small hydro plants in the environment (D14 of SHERPA project) APER’s report 2007-2008 on hydropower CD of Layman’s Guide in Italian (D15 of SHERPA project)

The Brochure of the Forum and Power Point presentations are available for download at http://www.aper.it/newsite/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3226&Itemid=386 The Programme of the forum was the following: 14.00-14.30 Registration of participants 14.30-14.45 Introduction to APER activities for hydropower sector, Marco Pigni e Sara Gollessi APER 14.45-15.00 Presentation of SHERPA project, Gema San Bruno - ESHA 15.00-15.20 Agreement APER-WWF: presentation of the activities , Andrea Agapito Ludovici WWF Italy 15.20-15.40 Agreement APER-Consorzio Muzza: irrigation, drainage and hydropower use, Ing. Ettore Fanfani Consorzio Muzza Bassa Lodigiana 15.40-16.00 Water protection plan for water courses affected by hydropower diversions, Pino Sansoni – Magra River Basin Authority 16.00-16.15 break 16.20-17.30 round table: R. Tiscar (Lombardia Regional Government, Water Department) W.Mattalia (Piemonte Regional Government, Water Department) A. Bosio (Associazione di Irrigazione Ovest Sesia, hydropower producer) L. Papetti (Studio Frosio, designer) A.Maffio (CESI Ricerca Spa, researcher) G.Tondi* (EACI - European Agency for Competitivness and Innovation) Chairman: Roberto Longo, President of APER 17.30 –18.00 discussion *

Mr Tondi couldn’t take part in the round table

The welcome address and opening remarks were made by Marco Pigni, Director of APER, who illustrated APER’s point of view and role: lobbying activity, training and dissemination, services for its members.

After that Sara Gollessi, APER responsible for hydropower, gave an overview on the Italian present situation and potential of the hydropower sector, with reference to the new European targets for 2020 and to the Italian Position Paper presented to the European Commission. She also illustrated the main barriers that are at the present moment hindering the development of

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the hydropower sector in Italy: long and complicated authorization procedure and strict environmental commitments (reserved flow, fish passes, compensation measures).

She also presented the contents of the folder provided to the participants, with a special focus on SHERPA project deliverables.

Gema San Bruno, ESHA Project Manager, gave an overview on SHERPA project. She explained that the overall objective of the project is to develop a promotion campaign for SHP in Europe, with the purpose of addressing the challenges and reducing the barriers that SHP is facing today.

Ms San Bruno also presented the different work packages and the expected deliverables and showed the strong commitment of all SHERPA partners for the involvement of environmental associations within the project activities.

Andrea Agapito Ludovici, Water Responsible for WWF Italy, presented the objective of the agreement with APER and illustrated some of the initiatives carried out together: field visits to different types of hydropower plants (on irrigation channels and on natural rivers), analysis of the 2 Directives for the water protection (2000/60/CE) and for the promotion of renewable energies (2001/77/EC), drafting of a common position paper on hydropower. The latter document gives an overview on the hydropower technology, on the Italian policy framework for water and energy, on the economic aspects (income and expenses) and contain a special focus on the criticalities of the sector and some proposals to overcome these problems. An example can be the implementation of a certification procedure for hydropower plants. WWF Italy will work again together with APER in the next years within the framework of CH2OICE project, which aims at gaining this target.

Ettore Fanfani, Director of Muzza Bassa Lodigiana irrigation consortium, presented the experience of the consortium, that is focused on irrigation and drainage activities, but is also promoting the realization of small hydropower plants along the channels they manage. A developing program in 3 steps has been planned: 5 plants are in operation, 5 are passing through the authorization procedure and some more are within the preliminary designing phase.

Mr Fanfani also illustrated the benefits for the agricultural sector in terms of monetary income, of contribution to the channel maintenance, of monitoring the hydrological parameters (rainfall, flow rate), of possibility to manage and control the water level within the channel network thanks to the creation of small artificial basins.

Pino Sansoni, biologist and consultant for Magra River Basin Authority, illustrated the contents of the water protection plan for water courses affected by hydropower diversions. The River Basin Authority started to work on this plan in 1998, involving also hydropower producers, and adopted a proportioned approach, in order to achieve a compromise between the environmental protection and the loss of hydropower productivity.

A prove of this result is that, after the issuing of the plan (2001), many other concessions have been asked.

After a short break, Mr Pigni chaired a round table with representatives of hydropower producers (Mr Bosio) and designers (Mr Papetti), of regional institutions (Mr Tiscar and Mr Mattalia), of research institutes (Mr Maffio). Mr Tondi, representative of the EACI in charge for SHERPA project, couldn’t take part in the round table.

Each speaker had the possibility to present his position and feelings with reference to the new European targets for renewable energies.

Mr Bosio and Mr Papetti focused on the main administrative barriers that are at the moment hindering the development of the hydropower sector and asked for a simplification of the authorization procedure. In fact both Lombardia and Piemonte Region delegated to the Provinces the authorization procedure without giving them any guidelines and this is causing a lot of confusion because each Province is adopting different procedures.

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Mr Tiscar presented the “Patto per l’Acqua”, an initiative of Lombardia Region that involved all the water stakeholders: farmers, hydropower producers, industrial users, environmental associations and so on. Everyone was asked to subscribe an agreement to optimize the water use in order to face the water scarcity that the Region is experimenting every year more critically.

With reference to the application of reserved flow, that is a critical problem for the hydro sector, he invited the producer to promote experimental studies, so as to adapt the reserved flow to the local environmental characteristics.

Mr Mattalia presented the activity of Piemonte Region within the adoption of the Water Protection Plan and of some technical regulations on reserved flow and on flow rate gauges. He also illustrated some experimentation activities on reserved flow that the Region is promoting in cooperation with Enel.

Mr Maffio presented the activity of CESI Ricerca, that is a research institute, on the estimation of the Italian possible hydropower productivity. CESI is also analyzing the contribute of hydropower plants to flood protection and is testing some hydrological models on a real plant in Trentino Alto Adige.

The round table was also the occasion for hydropower producer to talk directly to the representative of the regional institutions and to ask them for some clarifications.

The conference ended at 18.00 pm.

The conference hall

The attendance

Mr Ettore Fanfani, Muzza Consortium

Mr Pino Sansoni, Magra River Basin Authority

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Mr Pigni, Mr Tiscar and Mr Mattalia

Mr Bosio and Mr Papetti

The round table

Question time

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NEWS ITEMS

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