Search Results (13)

The Italian school building stock is largely outdated, with structural and technological inadequacies leading to low comfort and high energy consumption. Addressing this challenge requires large-scale renovation supported by an integrated, data-driven approach. This study conducted a nationwide analysis of over 40,000 school buildings. After incomplete or inconsistent records were filtered out, a refined subset was selected. Building forms were reconstructed by cross-referencing GIS data with multiple open data sources. Using supervised machine learning, the research identifies and classifies recurring morphological patterns to define a set of 3D school building archetypes. These archetypes are enriched with spatial configurations and physical characteristics aligned with national educational standards. The result is a macrotypological classification based on form, conceived as part of an operational tool to support policymakers, designers, and public administrations in selecting effective retrofit strategies. This contributes to the creation of large-scale national renovation strategies, as well as Renovation Roadmaps and Digital Building Logbooks in line with the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD IV), specifically tailored to the Italian context. The novelty of this work lies in its unprecedented scale and the use of AI to enable fast, replicable assessments of retrofit potential, thereby supporting informed decisions in energy-efficient renovation planning. Full article

An important task for the European Union is to transpose agreements and international standards in regulation and directives that are binding on member states. The resultant European action plans and directives identify priority areas in the building and energy sectors where circular economy principles can be applied. Italy records a general circular materials rate of 20.8%, surpassing the mean European value. But low recycling rates are still registered in the construction sector. This paper aims to assess the position of Italy with respect to the European regulatory framework on circularity in the energy transition of buildings. Firstly, the government’s initiatives and technical standards are introduced and commented upon. Secondly, the study illustrates the current Italian platforms, networks, and public and private initiatives highlighting opportunities and obstacles that the energy sector has to overcome in the area of circularity. It emerges that Italian policies still use voluntary tools that are not sufficiently in line with an effective circular economy model. Moreover, data collection plays a crucial role in accelerating the implementation of future actions. Italy should consider the foundation of a National Observatory for the Circular Economy to elaborate European directives, harmonize regional policies, and promote the implementation of effective practices. Full article

The implementation of Building Information Modelling (BIM) in public design processes enhances efficiency, transparency, and sustainability. However, public agencies often encounter significant barriers, particularly regarding organisational and managerial readiness. This study develops a BIM implementation framework tailored to the specific needs of an Italian public agency. The research adopts a qualitative approach, combining 15 semi-structured interviews with process mapping Using (Business Process Modeling Notation) BPMN. The current as-is workflows were analysed and validated by internal stakeholders. Based on this analysis, strategic objectives were defined, relevant (Building Information Modelling) BIM uses were selected, and revised to-be processes were proposed, integrating new roles and responsibilities according to the standards. The framework addresses both technical and organisational dimensions of BIM adoption, highlighting the need for training, coordination, and stakeholder engagement. The main outcomes include a structured process model, a priority-based selection of BIM uses, and a role matrix supporting organisational transformation. The added value for researchers lies in the replicable methodology that combines empirical process mapping with implementation planning. For practitioners, especially consultants in sustainable design, the study offers a practical roadmap for aligning BIM adoption with project goals, regulatory compliance, and environmental performance targets in complex public sector contexts. Full article

Background: Hereditary hemoglobin disorders are the most common globally distributed monogenic red cell diseases. The rights of women with thalassemia or sickle cell disease (SCD) to motherhood need to be protected by creating a roadmap to guide her, and her family network, along all the phases of the event. In fact, pregnancy in these vulnerable patients requires special attention and guidelines from the counseling stage (giving information about the special requirement and risks posed by their pregnancy with respect to the general population) the pre-conception stage, the early and mid-late pregnancy stage, to labor and lactation. The biocomplexity of these diseases requires a multidisciplinary team synergizing with gynecologists and obstetricians. In addition, the presence of a multicultural scenario requires healthcare workers to overcome stereotypes and adopt appropriate anthropological tools that might help them integrate the different cultural models of disease and motherhood. Methods: The Management Committee of the Society for Thalassemia and Hemoglobinopathies (SITE) selected and brought together a multidisciplinary and multiprofessional group made up of experts in hemoglobinopathies and experts in anthropology, flanked along with by experts with methodological and organizational expertise in order to create recommendations based on the integration of available scientific evidence together with expert opinion. Results: The panelists critically analyzed the literature, combining in a single document practices developed over several years of managing young women with hemoglobinopathies in a sensitive phase of their lives. Conclusions: This good practice document is the result of a collegial effort by Italian experts on hemoglobinopathies who are members of SITE. (SITE). Full article

Respiratory malignancies, encompassing cancers affecting the lungs, the trachea, and the bronchi, pose a significant and dynamic public health challenge. Given that air pollution stands as a significant contributor to the onset of these ailments, discerning the most detrimental agents becomes imperative for crafting policies aimed at mitigating exposure. This study advocates for the utilization of explainable artificial intelligence (XAI) methodologies, leveraging remote sensing data, to ascertain the primary influencers on the prediction of standard mortality rates (SMRs) attributable to respiratory cancer across Italian provinces, utilizing both environmental and socioeconomic data. By scrutinizing thirteen distinct machine learning algorithms, we endeavor to pinpoint the most accurate model for categorizing Italian provinces as either above or below the national average SMR value for respiratory cancer. Furthermore, employing XAI techniques, we delineate the salient factors crucial in predicting the two classes of SMR. Through our machine learning scrutiny, we illuminate the environmental and socioeconomic factors pertinent to mortality in this disease category, thereby offering a roadmap for prioritizing interventions aimed at mitigating risk factors. Full article

Honey bees, like other livestock, may be affected by infectious, parasitic, and abiotic diseases that need proper sanitary monitoring and control. Currently, there are limited opportunities for undergraduate students to receive education in Honey Bee Veterinary Medicine (HBVM) as part of their regular degree program, despite the professional requirements for veterinarians to carry out the increasing tasks related to honey bee health and production. Additionally, postgraduate training and specialization in HBVM is also underdeveloped. This study was an observational survey that evaluated the educational opportunities available in HBVM for current and future veterinarians in Italy. The survey analyzed both undergraduate and postgraduate programs, including Undergraduate Degree Programs in Veterinary Medicine (UDPVM), “Scuole di Specializzazione”, Masters, and other postgraduate courses. The results indicate that the current training available for veterinarians in the field of apiculture, both before and after graduation, is also insufficient in Italy, as already reported in other EU- and extra-EU countries. Finally, a roadmap for veterinary training in HBVM is developed here describing objectives and teachings aimed at fulfilling the needs of the profession in the field of beekeeping, considering the existing rules and regulations governing public health and possible evolution of this legal framework in the future. Full article

Renewable energy communities (RECs) aim at achieving economic, environmental, and social benefits for members and for society. This paper presents a roadmap for the design, operation, and monitoring of renewable energy communities in Italy, fundamental to guide and orient any stakeholder involved in the decision-making process of a REC. The roadmap is inspired by the Deming Cycle, also known as Plan-Do-Check-Act, which provides a framework for continuous improvement and standardization of the procedures. To demonstrate the practical application of the roadmap, a real case study is presented for Italian energy communities, making full adoption of data derived from official databases and using a real urban district as a case study. The findings of phase I in the “do” stage of the roadmap indicate that the REC could lead to a decrease in carbon emissions of roughly 38% and could support 51 to 67 families through REC’s revenues, depending on the installed PV capacity. Furthermore, both physical self-consumption and virtual self-consumption schemes assist in the sustainable transition of the built environment, where consumers have a significant impact on the electrical markets. Therefore, these results validate the roadmap’s effectiveness in promoting an informed design and implementation of RECs while guiding energy, social, and political decisions. Full article

The building sector is crucial in all of the possible net zero scenarios suggested for the European Union. In this area, the Italian situation is exemplary. Italy suffers from an aging and low-performance building stock and needs to increase its annual rate of energy retrofits in order to achieve its 2030 and 2050 targets. Even though since at least 2007, several different incentives schemes intended to stimulate energy-efficiency interventions have been in place, Italy has not been sufficiently able to promote deep retrofits. In 2020, in order to help the economy recover after the lockdowns that were introduced to face the first phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, the existing incentives were increased to up to 110% of investments for interventions that improved the energy class by at least two grades. This so-called “Superbonus” was also extended to the public social housing sector thanks to a credit assignment scheme. Given the results of this provisional phase, a possible policy roadmap for the energy renovation of the residential and educational building stock in Italy is presented in this paper through an analysis of data related to the implementation of current instruments in terms of number of interventions, investment needed, energy savings and evaluation of potential benefits and costs that can derive from an increase in the current deep-renovation rate. Through definition of a long-term renovation strategy, this paper illustrates how market barriers and other issues in instrument design can be tackled and how policymakers can help to develop a sustainable long-term roadmap for energy-efficient buildings. Beyond the residential sector, public buildings, particularly educational buildings, are taken into consideration as well, as they are places of collective use that represent the social values of fairness and sustainability and can therefore have an exemplary role for private initiatives. Full article

Universities are today seen as living labs for the creation of knowledge with the aim of transferring it to society. The integration of sustainability is a critical point in this context, as solutions for problems experienced in society can be experimented with regarding physical aspects, such as Solid Waste Management (SWM), and efficiency in energy and water use, but also social aspects such as accessibility, equality, and inclusion. This paper explores the implementation of similar SWM projects in two European universities, Milan-Bicocca University and Instituto Superior Técnico from Lisbon University. Milan-Bicocca was the pioneer project that followed an ambitious model that demanded the removal of all isolated waste bins from inside the offices and rooms, replacing them with waste collection islands in the public spaces. This meant a very coordinated procedure and communication plan, and inspired the pilot project in Instituto Superior Técnico, currently in the expansion phase. This paper describes the implementation of each model and their specificities, and a roadmap is proposed that resulted from the interactions, meetings, and discussions between the two teams, Italian and Portuguese. Full article

Background: In health, it is important to promote the effectiveness, efficiency and adequacy of the services provided; these concepts become even more important in the era of the COVID-19 pandemic, where efforts to manage the disease have absorbed all hospital resources. The COVID-19 emergency led to a profound restructuring—in a very short time—of the Italian hospital system. Some factors that impose higher costs on hospitals are inappropriate hospitalization and length of stay (LOS). The length of stay (LOS) is a very useful parameter for the management of services within the hospital and is an index evaluated for the management of costs. Methods: This study analyzed how COVID-19 changed the activity of the Complex Operative Unit (COU) of the Neurology and Stroke Unit of the San Giovanni di Dio e Ruggi d’Aragona University Hospital of Salerno (Italy). The methodology used in this study was Lean Six Sigma. Problem solving in Lean Six Sigma is the DMAIC roadmap, characterized by five operational phases. To add even more value to the processing, a single clinical case, represented by stroke patients, was investigated to verify the specific impact of the pandemic. Results: The results obtained show a reduction in LOS for stroke patients and an increase in the value of the diagnosis related group relative weight. Conclusions: This work has shown how, thanks to the implementation of protocols for the management of the COU of the Neurology and Stroke Unit, the work of doctors has improved, and this is evident from the values of the parameters taken into consideration. Full article

The Italian debate on the so-called ‘inner areas’ has received a much-needed boost, following the COVID-19 pandemic, which has further highlighted the differences between metropolitan and inner areas. While the progressive depopulation of inner areas is a worrying phenomenon, the limits of incessant urbanisation and the concentration of settlement and infrastructure policies in large conurbations have become evident. Departing from the framework of the B4R-Branding4Resilience research project of national interest and, by continuing in the furrow initiated by the SNAI, but also surpassing it, the aim of the University of Palermo’s research is to define the requirement for a more inclusive settlement model in the Sicani area in Sicily (Italy) to re-balance existing asymmetries by recharging peripheral areas with new centrality. The aims of the research are to demonstrate that inner areas could be an engine for innovation, thereby outlining a roadmap through which to encourage the resilience of new sustainable lifestyles. These aims would be achieved by working on new perspectives and projects, which are capable of radically modifying production, consumption, and tourism dynamics and work/life models, and which are gleaned from a study regarding the Sicani area in Sicily. The paper discusses case study quantitative and qualitative analyses and first results. Full article

This paper contributes to the climate policy discussion by focusing on the challenges and opportunities of reaching net zero emissions by 2050 in Italy. To support Italian energy planning, we developed energy roadmaps towards national climate neutrality, consistent with the Paris Agreement objectives and the IPCC goal of limiting the increase in global surface temperature to 1.5 °C. Starting from the Italian framework, these scenarios identify the correlations among the main pillars for the change of the energy paradigm towards net emissions by 2050. The energy scenarios were developed using TIMES-RSE, a partial equilibrium and technology-rich optimization model of the entire Italian energy system. Subsequently, an in-depth analysis was developed with the sMTISIM, a long-term simulator of power system and electricity markets. The results show that, to achieve climate neutrality by 2050, the Italian energy system will have to experience profound transformations on multiple and strongly related dimensions. A predominantly renewable-based energy mix (at least 80–90% by 2050) is essential to decarbonize most of the final energy consumption. However, the strong increase of non-programmable renewable sources requires particular attention to new flexibility resources needed for the power system, such as Power-to-X. The green fuels produced from renewables via Power-to-X will be a vital energy source for those sectors where electrification faces technical and economic barriers. The paper’s findings also confirm that the European “energy efficiency first” principle represents the very first step on the road to climate neutrality. Full article

The growing rate of electricity generation from renewables is leading to new operational and management issues on the power grid because the electricity generated exceeds local requirements and the transportation or storage capacities are inadequate. An interesting option that is under investigation by several years is the opportunity to use the renewable electricity surplus to power electrolyzers that split water into its component parts, with the hydrogen being directly injected into natural gas pipelines for both storage and transportation. This innovative approach merges together the concepts of (i) renewable power-to-hydrogen (P2H) and of (ii) hydrogen blending into natural gas networks. The combination of renewable P2H and hydrogen blending into natural gas networks has a huge potential in terms of environmental and social benefits, but it is still facing several barriers that are technological, economic, legislative. In the framework of the new hydrogen strategy for a climate-neutral Europe, Member States should design a roadmap moving towards a hydrogen ecosystem by 2050. The blending of “green hydrogen”, that is hydrogen produced by renewable sources, in the natural gas network at a limited percentage is a key element to enable hydrogen production in a preliminary and transitional phase. Therefore, it is urgent to evaluate at the same time (i) the potential of green hydrogen blending at low percentage (up to 10%) and (ii) the maximum P2H capacity compatible with low percentage blending. The paper aims to preliminary assess the green hydrogen blending potential into the Italian natural gas network as a tool for policy makers, grid and networks managers and energy planners. Full article