The Bank of Italy publishes the 2023 Environmental Report. With the Environmental Report, published for the first time in 2010, the Bank gives an account of the impact of its activities on the environment, as well as the actions taken and planned to reduce it. In 2022, the Bank's total greenhouse gas emissions decreased by 2 per cent compared to the previous year, remaining at levels approximately 22 per cent lower than in 2019, the last pre-pandemic year.
The Bank's main sources of greenhouse gas emissions are: energy and building management (44 per cent); mobility (home-work commutes and business trips, 31 per cent). Before 2019, greenhouse gas emissions (calculated according to a different methodology) had already decreased by 61 percent compared to 2010, mainly due to the purchase since 2013 of electricity coming exclusively from renewable sources.
Compared to 2021, there was a 20 percent reduction in the consumption of fuel for heating and related emissions. Electricity consumption decreased by 2 percent; those of office paper by 27 percent. From 2023, all worn-out banknotes withdrawn from circulation and reduced to fragments are sent to waste-to-energy plants, in line with ECB guidelines.
During the year, the Bank released its Strategic Plan for the three-year period 2023-25: one of the five objectives of the Plan is dedicated to increasing the commitment to the environment through numerous projects to reduce the Bank's environmental and carbon footprint. A transition plan will also be drawn up over the two-year period with the detailed objectives and actions to be implemented, in order to achieve the goal of net zero emissions for internal operations over the long term.
Based on research carried out internationally by an independent body, the Bank of Italy was the second greenest central bank of the G20 countries. To ensure full accessibility of information and data, the Environmental Report is also published on the website in html format; the statistical tables are made available in Excel and CSV formats.