EVOLVE | EDITORIAL
2
TOWARDS ENVIRONMENTAL
RESILIENCE
ore than forty years have passed since the great oil crisis that, as a result of the embargo decreed by OPEC in October 1973, stopped private cars in the United States and allied countries in Europe, including Italy. The Italian government passed an austerity decree that imposed price increases on gasoline and diesel fuel for heating, but also a sort of “curfew” to limit energy consumption, very similar to the lockdown we have recently experienced. Every Sunday restricted to bicycle use saved the equivalent of 50 million liters of fuel.
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In the following years - still mindful of the measures they had undergone such as the cutting of public lighting, the reduction of stores opening hours, the early closure of cinemas, bars and restaurants and the suspension of television programs at 11 p.m. – observers and politicians of the time suggested that the way out would be to dismiss oil as an energy source, in favor of coal, which was not subject to the will of OPEC. Fortunately, we noticed that all of this did not happen: not only has coal not replaced crude oil, but the issue of sustainability and the focus on climate change has gained ground. Today more than ever, as we make our way out of the health and economic crisis of Covid-19, which has similarities to the oil shock of the 1970s due to the restrictions on mobility and the economic impact, sustainability is at the heart of any industrial restart strategy. The term is in use not only in companies at every level and among politicians of every rank: at universities, even before the coronavirus, future managers had already begun to redesign the development paradigms for the third millennium. Because the energy transition is an irreversible path, a new model of daily life: not simply a response to climate change. The pandemic has forced us, on one hand, to react from an economic perspective formulating strategies to bring back growth to our GDP; on the other hand, we have had to reflect
N° 6 - DECEMBER 2020
