81 to 51: Italy's Senate Reopens the Nuclear Door 38 Years After Voters Shut It
September 27, 2026 · Frisian News
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Italy's Senate passed a nuclear enabling law by 81 votes to 51 on September 23, thirty-eight years after a 1987 referendum rejected atomic power. The law gives the government 12 months to draft licensing decrees; no reactor has been authorised and the first plant is not expected before the mid-2030s.
Eighty-one senators voted in favour on September 23, almost 40 years after Italian voters rejected nuclear power in a 1987 referendum triggered by Chernobyl. The Senate passed the enabling law by 81 votes to 51 with seven abstentions, completing a bill that had already cleared the Chamber of Deputies on June 4 by 155 votes to 86.
The law authorises no reactor. It gives the government 12 months to issue decrees on licensing, safety, spent fuel, radioactive waste and site selection, with a further 24 months for corrections, Brussels Signal reports. Environment and energy security minister Gilberto Pichetto Fratin, who sponsored the bill, said the first reactor could be running by 2033 or 2034. Italy's national energy and climate plan foresees between 8 gigawatts and 16 gigawatts of nuclear capacity by 2050, covering 11 to 22 per cent of electricity demand, Brussels Signal adds.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni called the vote "a brave and common-sense choice." Pichetto Fratin told the Senate that Italy cannot "stand idly by" while other countries develop nuclear capacity, citing energy market volatility and geopolitical tensions, World Nuclear News reports. The government frames the law as a response to rising electricity demand from data centres and industrial electrification, and points to energy shocks from the Ukraine War and the conflict involving Iran, according to Brussels Signal.
The gap between that argument and Italy's actual record spans almost four decades. After closing its last two plants, Caorso and Trino Vercellese, in 1990 following the 1987 vote, a second referendum in 2011 buried revival again: World Nuclear News reports that 94 per cent of voters then rejected any new reactor construction. Italy has spent the decades since importing electricity generated by nuclear plants across its borders, Greek City Times notes. It still lacks a permanent national repository for waste from its old programme, and no region has yet volunteered to host a new facility, Italy Telegraph reports.
The cost picture offers little comfort to the official line. Academic estimates cited by Italy Telegraph place small modular reactor construction costs at between 4,000 and 6,000 euros per kilowatt, against a competitive threshold for Italy of 2,200 euros per kilowatt. Only three SMRs are operational worldwide, one in China and two in Russia, and none has demonstrated the promised cost advantages over traditional reactors, that outlet notes. France's Flamanville conventional reactor ballooned from 3.3 billion euros to 19.1 billion euros, Italy Telegraph adds, while industry estimates put a single 300-megawatt SMR at between 3 billion and 6 billion euros, Brussels Signal reports. The Italian government has committed 67.5 million euros from the Infrastructure Investment and Development Fund for 2027 to 2029 and earmarked 135 million euros for nuclear research and development, with 200 million euros already invested in the startup Newcleo, Italy Telegraph reports.
Italy also lacks domestic uranium reserves, which complicates the energy independence argument, Italy Telegraph notes. The global uranium supply chain is dominated by Russia, Kazakhstan and Canada. Michele Governatori, a senior adviser at climate think tank ECCO, told Brussels Signal that the framework would "make clear the limited interest of private investors" in technologies that are not yet competitive or commercially ready.
The vote does align Italy with a broader European shift. France's 2026 to 2035 energy plan envisions six new EPR2 reactors and extensions for all 57 existing units, according to Italy Telegraph. Sweden has abandoned its 100 per cent renewable target in favour of a fossil-free grid and has greenlighted two conventional reactors by 2035. On the day of the Senate vote, French SMR developer Nuward and its parent EDF, alongside Edison and Italian partners Ansaldo and Maire, confirmed a shared ambition to deploy a first SMR in Italy by 2035, World Nuclear News reports.
Almost four decades of prohibition bought Italy exactly zero energy independence. The first electrons from a new Italian reactor are still a decade away.
Published September 27, 2026 · Frisian News