THE Vatican seeks to become the world’s first carbon-neutral state, in a €100-million project to make it fully reliant on solar energy.
The Secretary for Relations with States, Archbishop Paul Gallagher, signed an agreement on Thursday with the Italian Ambassador to the Holy See, Francesco Di Nitto, for the Vatican to obtain electricity from a new agrivoltaic plant at Santa Maria di Galeria, a 1000-acre site north of Rome that currently houses Vatican Radio’s transmission towers.
In a communiqué, Vatican Radio said that the project had been designed “to respect the natural landscape, minimise the environmental impact, and protect the cultural and archaeological heritage”.
It continued: “Upholding and taking action on a shared commitment to promote ecological responsibility and sustainable development, . . . the initiative is being hailed as a tangible expression of strong bilateral relations between the Holy See and Italy, reflecting a shared commitment to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change”.
An Associated Press report said that the Vatican, which joined the UN Framework Convention in 2022, would be exempted from an Italian import tax on solar panels, and would donate any excess electricity to the local community. The project, it said, would form part of Italy’s clean-energy targets under the European Union’s 2030 climate-action programme.
Papal appeals against climate change and environmental degradation were a feature of the 12-year pontificate of the late Pope Francis, who unveiled plans for the Santa Maria project in an apostolic letter, Fratello Sole, last year.
On a site visit in June, Pope Leo XIV endorsed the project as a “very important example”. He celebrated the first votive mass “for the care of creation” (pro custodia creationis) on 9 July at the Borgo Laudato Si’, set up by Pope Francis, in Castel Gandolfo.
Up to 50 countries worldwide are currently believed to generate at least half their energy from solar, wind, and other sources. Several countries — including Albania, Iceland, Ethiopia, and Congo — gain more than 90 per cent of their energy from renewable sources.
In a message for the tenth World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, on 1 September, Pope Leo XIV quotes extensively from Pope Francis’s 2015 encyclical Laudato Si’. He denounces the “greed” that fuels “deforestation, pollution, and loss of biodiversity”, and describes the pursuit of environmental justice as a “duty born of faith”.
All vehicles used on the Vatican’s 121-acre territory are to become carbon-dioxide-neutral under an ecological-conversion programme announced in November 2023. In June, a zero-impact plan was unveiled to make St Peter’s Basilica, which attracts up to 90,000 visitors daily, an environmental “model for cultural heritage sites worldwide”.