Italy Just Gave Coal 13 More Years. The Climate Dominos Are Starting to Fall.

In 2017, Italy made a promise to the world. Its National Energy Strategy committed the country to eliminating coal-fired power generation by 2025. In 2024, as G7 president, Italy hosted the landmark agreement for all G7 nations to phase out unabated coal power by 2035. Then it broke its word. On March 27, 2026, the Italian parliament voted to extend coal plant operations to 2038. Thirteen additional years. Not phase-out but life extension. Not commitment but retreat. Italy’s reversal matters not for its direct emissions impact but for the structural damage it does to international climate cooperation. When a major player pulls back, collective resolve weakens across the board. The Paris Agreement’s architecture was designed to ratchet ambition upward over time. Italy’s reversal introduces a ratchet in the opposite direction, one that other nations under domestic pressure may find irresistible to follow. (Carbon Pulse: Italy moves to delay coal power phaseout by 13 years)

The trigger for the extension lies on the other side of the Strait of Hormuz. The outbreak of war with Iran in late February 2026 and the subsequent blockade of the Strait disrupted European energy markets for the second time in four years. Italy is exceptionally dependent on imported natural gas, which accounts for approximately 40 percent of its total energy supply. About 12 percent of that gas came from Qatar as liquefied natural gas, a flow that was cut off when the Hormuz blockade made Persian Gulf shipping untenable. European gas prices have surged 70 percent since the conflict began. Italian industry and households are caught in a double squeeze of rising costs. In Sicily and Calabria, winter heating bills rose more than 50 percent year over year, forcing municipal governments to provide emergency heating subsidies. Northern manufacturing regions face surging electricity costs that are crushing small and medium enterprises. Italian electricity prices were already among the highest in the EU, second only to Germany, and further increases were testing the limits of social tolerance. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing coalition government invoked “energy security” as the justification for keeping coal plants operational. The political calculus was straightforward: Italian voters facing surging energy bills would not accept a government that simultaneously closed power plants, even if those plants contribute only marginally to the country’s electricity supply. The coalition, which includes parties with historically skeptical positions on climate policy, seized the opportunity to reframe fossil fuel extension as pragmatic crisis management rather than environmental retreat. Opinion polling conducted in early March showed that energy affordability had overtaken immigration as the top voter concern in Italy for the first time since 2022, giving the government strong democratic cover for a decision that climate advocates viewed as catastrophic. (Beyond Fossil Fuels: Italy delays coal phase-out to 2038)

The extension was embedded in legislation originally designed for an entirely different purpose. The coal provision was inserted into an “energy bills” decree whose stated aim was to protect consumers from price shocks. During parliamentary review on March 27, the amendment extending coal operations by 13 years was approved with minimal debate. The urgency of the energy crisis provided cover for a fundamental rewrite of long-term climate policy. Senate approval is expected, and the measure’s enactment is considered a formality. The speed of the legislative process stood in stark contrast to the magnitude of the policy change. A decision with 13 years of consequences was embedded in emergency legislation and approved in a matter of days, with no dedicated committee hearings, no formal environmental impact assessment, and no public consultation process. Angelo Bonelli, leader of the Europa Verde green party, accused the government of “climate neglect.” But the procedural concern extends beyond environmental politics. Embedding a 13-year policy reversal inside an emergency consumer protection bill, without adequate impact assessment or dedicated debate, raises questions about the transparency of the legislative process itself. (Muser Press: Italy delays coal phase-out by over a decade)

The deepest irony is that experts describe the extension as largely pointless in practical terms. The Italian climate think tank ECCO assessed the decision as “symbolically damaging but low-impact in practice.” Italian electricity prices are determined for most hours of the day by natural gas prices and EU Emissions Trading System rules, not by coal plant operations. Extending coal will not meaningfully reduce electricity costs or significantly increase emissions. In other words, the policy change delivers almost no energy security benefit while inflicting outsized damage on climate policy credibility. ECCO further warned that the extension could delay renewable energy investment by sending a signal that Italy’s energy policy direction is uncertain. Private capital needed for the energy transition requires policy predictability. A 13-year extension creates 13 years of ambiguity about whether Italy is moving toward or away from decarbonization, and that ambiguity itself becomes a barrier to the investment flows that could actually solve the energy security problem. The assessment that the extension is “ineffective and costly” came not from environmental activists but from energy economics specialists, a distinction that matters. When the critique of a fossil fuel extension comes from within the energy industry’s own analytical community rather than from environmental campaigners, it carries a different kind of authority, one that is harder for governments to dismiss as ideological. (ECCO: Extending coal phase-out risks being ineffective and costly)

The core problem is that Italy’s decision does not stay within Italy’s borders. Germany, South Korea, the Philippines, and Japan have all signaled that coal plants could help ease energy pressures caused by the Middle East war. The pattern is unmistakable: an energy crisis caused by fossil fuel dependence is being met with more fossil fuels. As multiple European think tanks have noted, this is the paradox of seeking solutions from the very source of vulnerability. If Italy’s move establishes a precedent, it provides other nations with political cover to walk back their own climate commitments. Italy is the world’s eighth-largest economy, a founding member of the EU, and a G7 constituent. Its policy reversal carries qualitatively different weight from that of a smaller nation. At COP26, Poland reversed its coal phase-out pledge hours after signing it, demonstrating how fragile these commitments can be under political pressure. But Italy is a different order of magnitude. The first domino may have fallen. The mechanism of contagion in climate policy is well documented. When a high-profile nation retreats from a commitment, it lowers the political cost of retreat for others. The calculation shifts from ‘we must act because everyone is acting’ to ‘why should we sacrifice when others are not.’ This erosion of collective resolve is the single greatest threat to the multilateral climate framework, and it requires only one or two significant defections to begin. (Euronews: Italy clings to coal as EU countries shield with renewables)

Euronews drew an instructive contrast in its coverage. While Italy clings to coal, some EU member states are treating the Middle East war as a reason to accelerate the renewable transition rather than retreat from it. Spain announced emergency expansion of solar capacity. Denmark fast-tracked its offshore wind auction process. Facing the same crisis, different countries are making opposite policy choices. This divergence illustrates that the energy transition is simultaneously a technical challenge, a question of political will, and a test of institutional capacity. Italy chose short-term political safety over long-term climate security. But Spain and Denmark’s choices demonstrate that the same crisis can be framed as a reason for decarbonization rather than against it. If fossil fuel dependence created the vulnerability, then reducing that dependence is the logical risk mitigation strategy, an argument that holds up on economic rationality grounds as well as environmental ones. The IEA’s own analysis has repeatedly shown that investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency are the most cost-effective response to fossil fuel supply disruptions over any horizon longer than a few months. The short-term political appeal of keeping existing coal plants running is real, but it comes at the expense of the medium-term investments that would actually reduce vulnerability to the next supply shock. Every euro spent maintaining an aging coal plant is a euro not spent on the solar panels, wind turbines, grid batteries, and transmission upgrades that would make the next Hormuz crisis less devastating. (Climate Change News: Italy pushes coal exit back after gas prices rise)

The timing intersects with a pivotal moment for EU climate governance. The European Commission is preparing post-2030 climate rules, reviewing the emissions trading system, and negotiating the next long-term budget. Italy’s coal extension weakens EU internal cohesion on climate policy at precisely the moment when unity is most needed. As the EU’s third-largest economy, Italy’s policy direction carries disproportionate influence within EU councils. The same country that wielded the G7 presidency to champion coal phase-out in 2024 is now extending coal’s life by 13 years. In COP31 negotiations, developing nations will inevitably cite Italy’s reversal to justify their own continued coal use. The rhetorical question writes itself: if advanced economies cannot keep their own promises, why should developing nations bear disproportionate sacrifice? The G7 does not yet have an effective answer to that question. The credibility deficit created by Italy’s reversal will compound over time, particularly as COP31 negotiations in 2026 address the critical question of climate finance for developing nations. How can wealthy nations ask developing countries to accept constraints on their development pathways when G7 members themselves are extending the life of the dirtiest form of electricity generation?

For Japan, this is not a distant European affair. Japan is also a G7 member committed to phasing out unabated coal power by 2035. But the Hormuz blockade has hit Japan’s energy supply directly, and domestic pressure to extend coal plant lifetimes is intensifying. Coal accounts for roughly 30 percent of Japan’s power generation, producing approximately 280 terawatt-hours annually, an order of magnitude larger than Italy’s few remaining percentage points of coal-generated electricity. If Japan follows Italy’s precedent, the impact on G7 climate credibility would be several times greater. Japan’s coal retreat would also send shockwaves through Asia, potentially giving China and India cover to expand their own coal programs. Within METI, ammonia co-firing technology for coal plants is being promoted as a “transition solution,” but there is growing awareness that the international community may view it as a pretext for coal extension rather than a genuine pathway to decarbonization. The path Japan should take is not to follow Italy backward but to pursue the harder, more sustainable third option: accelerating the energy transition while maintaining security buffers through diversified supply and strategic reserves. The ammonia co-firing technology being developed for Japanese coal plants represents a genuine technical innovation, but its credibility as a transition pathway depends entirely on whether it leads to actual emissions reductions on a verifiable timeline rather than serving as a mechanism to keep coal infrastructure operating indefinitely under a green label. The international community will judge Japan not by its technological announcements but by its emissions trajectory.

Italy’s remaining seven coal plants are aging infrastructure with uncertain futures regardless of policy. Facilities like the Portoscuso plant in Sardinia and the Brindisi plant in Puglia were built decades ago and are approaching or exceeding their designed operational lifespans. Even with a 2038 extension, the physical limitations of the equipment may force closure before the legal deadline. This means the extension functions less as a plan to burn coal for 13 more years and more as a political message that decarbonization is no longer urgent. That message, directed at a domestic audience seeking reassurance on energy costs, reverberates far beyond Italy’s borders. The ambiguity it creates, neither committed to coal nor committed to exit, undermines the policy predictability that renewable energy investors require. The result may be the worst of both worlds: coal plants that close anyway due to obsolescence, combined with delayed renewable investment due to policy uncertainty. Italy’s renewable energy sector, which had been growing rapidly with solar installations in the south and wind development in Sardinia and Sicily, now faces a chilling effect. Developers report that financing terms have tightened since the coal extension announcement, as lenders factor in the increased policy risk. The European Investment Bank, which had been a major financier of Italian renewable projects, has privately expressed concern about the signal the extension sends to capital markets. When governments create uncertainty about whether they are moving toward or away from clean energy, the cost of capital for green projects rises, making the transition more expensive and slower, which in turn makes future coal extensions more politically attractive. It is a self-reinforcing vicious cycle that Italy has now entered, and extracting itself will require even greater political will than simply staying the original course would have demanded.

Fossil fuel retrenchment and renewable acceleration are running simultaneously across 2026 Europe. These two contradictory vectors coexist within a single continent, sometimes within a single country. Which one ultimately prevails will be determined at the intersection of politics, markets, and technology. The outcome is not predetermined. Europe’s coal consumption has been declining structurally for over a decade, driven by economics as much as policy. In 2025, coal generated less than 12 percent of EU electricity, down from over 25 percent a decade earlier. The trend line points firmly toward exit. But trend lines can be bent by political decisions, and a cluster of coal extensions across multiple countries could slow the decline significantly, potentially adding hundreds of millions of tons of cumulative emissions over the next decade compared to a scenario where phase-out commitments were maintained. The marginal cost of those additional emissions, in terms of climate damage, will be borne disproportionately by the Global South, by island nations facing inundation, by African communities confronting drought, by Asian megacities exposed to increasingly severe flooding. The distributional injustice of coal extension decisions made in Rome and potentially followed in Berlin or Tokyo is not an abstraction. It has a geography, and that geography falls overwhelmingly on the world’s poorest and most vulnerable. Renewable energy costs have fallen dramatically over the past decade, and solar power is already cheaper than coal in many regions. But cost alone does not drive political decisions. Grid infrastructure, storage technology deployment, workforce transition from legacy industries, and above all the urgent demand for stable electricity right now all shape the choices that elected officials actually make. The energy transition presents itself to politicians not as a question of right versus wrong but as a question of now versus later. Italy chose later, and later turned into 13 more years. The psychology of delay is powerful in climate politics because the costs of inaction are diffuse, delayed, and distributed globally, while the costs of action are concentrated, immediate, and borne locally. A politician who closes a coal plant faces angry workers and higher electricity bills in the next election cycle. A politician who keeps it open faces consequences that will manifest decades later, long after they have left office, in the form of more extreme heat waves in southern Europe, accelerating Mediterranean sea level rise, increasing wildfire severity in regions like Sardinia and Calabria, and more destructive storms that affect people in other countries more than their own constituents. The incentive structure of democratic politics is structurally biased toward delay, and overcoming that bias requires extraordinary political courage or extraordinary public pressure. Italy’s government experienced neither. The IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report warned that achieving the 1.5-degree target requires a 43 percent reduction in global greenhouse gas emissions from 2019 levels by 2030. That deadline is less than four years away. At this moment, a G7 member has chosen to extend coal’s life. The symbolic weight of that choice, even if its direct emissions impact is limited, is sufficient to alter the dynamics of international climate negotiations. Paris Agreement promises are words on paper. Actions give those words life. When actions retreat, promises quietly die, before the ink on the ratification documents has dried. And beyond the fallen dominoes lies the irreversible acceleration of climate change itself. Whether Italy’s 13-year extension becomes the first domino in a cascade of climate backsliding or provokes a backlash that strengthens resolve elsewhere will be determined in the coming months. What is certain is that standing fallen dominoes back up is far harder than knocking them down. Climate change does not wait. Extending coal by 13 years will not reduce atmospheric CO2 by a single part per million. The cost of that choice will be paid by the people living in the world of 2038, a world that will be measurably warmer, measurably more volatile in its weather patterns, and measurably less forgiving of the decisions made in this decade. The atmospheric physics of climate change operates on timescales that make political cycles, and even generational cycles, look trivially short. Carbon dioxide emitted today will remain in the atmosphere for centuries, long after the politicians who authorized its emission have left office, and long after the energy crisis of 2026, the crisis that served as the justification for delay, has been forgotten by everyone except the historians who will study how the world failed to act when it still could. Italy’s 13-year extension may be, as ECCO argues, largely symbolic in its direct impact on emissions. But symbols matter in international diplomacy. And the symbol Italy has sent to the world is this: when the pressure rises, even a G7 climate champion will choose coal. That symbol will echo in negotiating rooms from Bonn to Baku for years to come, cited by every delegation seeking to justify its own retreat. Whether Italy intended to send that message is beside the point. The message has been sent, and the world has received it. In international climate diplomacy, actions speak with a volume that no amount of subsequent rhetoric can match. Italy can attend every future COP, sign every communique, and pledge renewed ambition. But the 2038 date on its coal legislation will be cited by skeptics and foot-draggers for years, perhaps decades, to come. And that may prove to be the most expensive coal Italy has ever burned.