Rome, Italy (Photo by Caleb Miller on Unsplash)
Rome and Naples Face Italy’s Worst Heat Burden. Rooftop Solar Is Barely Making a Dent.
In A Nutshell
- Rising temperatures could push Italy’s residential electricity demand up by 2 to 3 terawatt-hours per year, a roughly 5% increase driven almost entirely by air conditioning use.
- Rooftop solar panels could cut individual household grid reliance by nearly 50% during peak summer demand, but expanded adoption across the country would still only reduce national summer cooling consumption by 15% to 18%.
- Cities in central and southern Italy, particularly Rome and Naples, face the highest cooling demand while having among the lowest solar installation rates, creating a growing equity gap.
- Researchers say subsidies and updated building codes are needed to close the solar gap in heat-exposed urban areas before the problem gets worse.
Italy’s summers are getting harder to live through. Millions of households are running air conditioning more as temperatures climb, and that surge in cooling is squeezing the country’s electrical grid. A new study finds that rising temperatures could push Italy’s residential electricity demand up by as much as 2 to 3 terawatt-hours per year, roughly a 5% increase relative to 2023 residential electricity consumption. That number is only expected to grow.
Rooftop solar panels could cut household reliance on the grid by almost half during peak summer demand periods, offering both climate and cost benefits. But the cities suffering most from heat are also the ones with the fewest solar panels installed. Taken together, the findings point to a solar equity problem that could worsen as summers heat up.
Researchers at Ca’ Foscari University in Venice published the work in Environmental Research: Energy. The team combined data on household electricity use, current and projected solar panel installations, and temperature projections from four global climate models to build a city-by-city picture of where Italy stands and where it is falling behind.
Solar Output and Cooling Demand Peak at the Same Time
Solar panels and air conditioning turn out to be natural partners. Sunshine peaks precisely when temperatures climb and people are running their AC units hardest. Households with rooftop solar can draw on that power directly, reducing how much electricity they pull from the broader grid. In a high solar adoption scenario, this alignment could reduce grid-supplied summer electricity consumption by somewhere between 15% and 18% at the national level. For individual households with solar already installed, the reduction in grid reliance during peak periods is even sharper, approaching 50%.
That is the good news. The bad news is that the places with the most to gain are not gaining it. Large, densely populated cities in central and southern Italy, including Rome and Naples, are at the center of heat exposure but have persistently low solar installation rates. Meanwhile, areas in northern Italy and on the islands of Sicily and Sardinia, where installation rates are relatively higher, stand to see sizable benefits from solar generation.
Even an Optimistic Solar Buildout Won’t Fully Offset Rising Cooling Demand
Researchers ran three scenarios against each other, starting with a historical baseline using electricity consumption and climate data from 1991 to 2010. From there, they projected what happens if temperatures rise but solar adoption stays frozen at today’s levels, then layered in a third scenario where both temperatures and solar adoption increase together, following projections from Italy’s national grid operator.
Projections indicate that average solar panel ownership across Italy could rise from about 6% of households in 2023 to between 14% and 15% by 2030, and between 22% and 24% by 2050. To account for uncertainty in future warming, the team used four global climate models, each offering slightly different projections for how Italian temperatures will shift through 2050.
Even under the more optimistic solar expansion scenarios, the numbers are sobering. Expanded solar deployment softens the blow but does not erase it, and whatever gains materialize are not shared equally across the country.
Rome and Naples Bear the Most Heat, With the Least Solar Protection
A clear geographic divide emerged once researchers mapped the results city by city. Several northern regions and island areas see the largest reductions, with Sardinia, Trentino, and Friuli seeing solar reduce their additional cooling-related electricity demand by more than 15%. Sicily stands out for combining high cooling needs with significant relative reductions, helping take pressure off the grid during the hottest months.
Rome and Naples tell a different story. Both cities rank among the leaders in raw additional cooling demand, but their solar installation rates remain low, meaning only a small share of that burden is being offset by rooftop generation. Per the study, the western coast of central Italy, particularly around Rome and Naples, hosts the largest relative increases in cooling-related electricity demand.
Subsidies and updated building codes are among the tools authors say could push solar adoption higher in these underserved areas. Without targeted action, heat-exposed and densely populated cities may miss out on the protection that solar power offers, raising equity concerns that go beyond energy policy into basic questions of who gets to stay cool when summers turn brutal.
Notably, the study treats solar as both an emissions-cutting tool and a way to help households handle rising cooling demand, two functions not often analyzed together. Reducing pressure on the grid and keeping homes cooler during the hottest months will require directing solar investment exactly where it is needed most, and right now, the places that need it most are the ones least prepared for it.
Disclaimer: This article is based on a peer-reviewed study and is intended for informational purposes only. The findings reflect the authors’ projections and models and should not be interpreted as definitive forecasts. Consult qualified energy or policy professionals before making decisions based on this research.
Paper Notes
Limitations
Several important constraints apply to this study. The behavioral estimates used to model how households change their electricity use in response to temperature and solar ownership are drawn primarily from data in Brescia, a single Italian city. While the authors note that Brescia closely mirrors national averages on key measures, they cannot fully rule out that results might differ in regions with older building stock or different climates, particularly in southern Italy. The model holds the relationship between temperature and electricity consumption constant over time, which may overestimate cooling demand toward 2050 if appliance efficiency improves or buildings become better insulated. The analysis focuses entirely on residential rooftop solar and does not account for large-scale, ground-mounted solar installations, which are expected to make up the majority of future solar capacity in Italy. Battery storage is also excluded from the modeling, meaning the estimated benefits of solar may understate what a combined solar-plus-storage system could achieve. Finally, the projections rely on official scenarios from Italy’s national grid operator, which may not reflect the impact of future policy changes specifically targeting low-adoption regions.
Funding and Disclosures
This study was funded by the European Union through the NextGenerationEU program, Mission 4, Component 2, as part of the GRINS — Growing Resilient, INclusive and Sustainable project (GRINS PE00000018 — CUP C83C22000890001). The authors state that the views and opinions expressed are solely their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union.
Publication Details
Authors: Lucia Piazza and Francesco Pietro Colelli, Department of Economics, Ca’ Foscari University, Venice, Italy. Francesco Pietro Colelli is also affiliated with EIEE-CMCC, Venice. | Journal: Environmental Research: Energy, Volume 3 (2026), article 025025 | Paper Title: ‘Synergies between climate mitigation and adaptation: the role of photovoltaics in meeting cooling demand in Italy’ | DOI: 10.1088/2753-3751/ae6dc0 | Published: June 2, 2026. Open access under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence.
