Energy transition pathways towards carbon neutrality: the 2035 Apulia case

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Abstract Changing how society perceives and uses energy is essential, and a change in the way energy is produced is also needed. Europe is striving to become the first climate neutral continent in 2050: therefore, it is crucial to draw a pathway to achieve this result. In this paper different energy scenarios for 2035 for a southern Italian region are analysed. As the major goal, carbon emissions reduction must be at least half of the current, considering 2035 as a halfway point between current situation and carbon neutrality goal set for 2050. The aim of this work is to analyse the role of a major increase in energy production from either photovoltaics or wind, to achieve which option is the best to be chosen. Photovoltaics and wind are green but also intermittent energy technologies. Therefore, it is beyond doubt that the uncontrollable nature of sun and wind sources requires to store energy. Doubling the total energy production from wind and photovoltaics, results show different conditions in terms of energy storage required and investment and operation costs. The methodology used is numerical simulation of the Apulia case through EnergyPLAN software. Best conditions are achieved for higher energy production rate from wind, compared to current values. 50% emissions reduction goal is achieved for all analysed scenarios.