Italy offers fiscal breaks to PV projects built with EU-made solar modules

Rome: The Italian government published the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) 2 in the country’s official journal on March 2, introducing new fiscal credits to purchase components for renewable energy projects.

Barbara Paulangelo, partner and technical director for Italian consultancy Reliable Energy Advisor (REA), told pv magazine that the fiscal credits will be given to projects that achieve a reduction in energy consumption.

The fiscal credits for PV could reach up to 35% of the cost of the solar modules and will be awarded to projects that exclusively use solar panels made in the European Union. They will be awarded to projects with panels with module efficiency ratings of more than 21.5%, or products with cell efficiencies above 23.5%. They will also be awarded to projects that use either heterojunction or perovskite-silicon tandem modules with efficiencies of more than 24%.

Celeste Mellone of Italian law firm Green Horse Advisory said the tax credits will be recognized for up to 35% of a total investment of up to €2.5 million ($2.71 million) and up to 5% for total investments of €10 million.

“The maximum limit of eligible costs is equal to €50 million per year per beneficiary company,” said Mellone. “These measures are designed for plants intended for self-consumption, but in principle we can’t exclude that an excess quota possibly released into the grid could be compatible with the public incentives recognized by the Gestore dei Servizi Energetici.”

The decree said that the possible beneficiaries are “companies resident in the national territory, regardless of the legal form, the economic sector to which they belong, the size and the tax regime for determining the company’s income.”
The investments must be made in the 2024-25 period. The plan provides resources equal to €6.3 billion, which are added to the €6.4 billion already set out under Italy’s budget law, for a total of approximately €13 billion.