Italians’ homes consume less energy and pollute less than they did a few years ago. This is not an advertising campaign slogan, but the result that emerges from an analysis of energy performance certificates reworked by Confedilizia from Enea data. Between 2018 and 2024, the primary energy consumption of homes was reduced by almost 13 percent, while carbon dioxide emissions fell by 14 percent. Numbers that tell a concrete transformation of the national building stock.
The key parameter is the index that measures how much primary energy is needed per year per square meter and determines the energy class of buildings. In 2018, the average value was 192.5 kWh per square meter; in 2024 it dropped to 167.7. A sharp decline, which Confedilizia notes, accelerated especially in the last few years, between 2022 and 2024, the period when government incentives for energy efficiency began to take effect on a large scale.
The map of energy classes
Even more pronounced is the reduction in the consumption of non-renewable energy, that related to gas and fossil fuels. The indicator has decreased by nearly 17 percent in six years, with more than half of the improvement concentrated in the last three years. This was achieved thanks to the increased efficiency of systems, from building envelopes to boilers, and the spread of heat pumps.
The improvement in energy performance is also reflected in the energy class map. Homes in class G, the worst, fell from more than 32 percent to just over 24 percent. Those in class F have dropped slightly, while the share of class A homes has almost doubled, from 8 percent to 15 percent. This is an important rebalancing, because the difference between an energy-efficient and an energy-hungry home is significant. In 2024, a Class A4 home consumed an average of about 66 kWh per square meter per year, compared with nearly 293 kWh for a Class G home. On the emissions front, the gap is even more striking: just over 3 kg of CO₂ per square meter versus nearly 57.
Pushing up the top classes has not only been renovations, but also new construction, designed with much more advanced energy standards. Among buildings constructed from 2016 onward, nearly half are already in class A4, and more than three-quarters are in the most efficient classes overall. The downside, however, remains clear: recent buildings account for just 6 percent of energy certificates. The bulk of Italy’s housing stock dates from after World War II, between 1945 and 1976, and more than half of these homes are still stuck in F and G classes.
Moving to a stable strategy
So the incentives have worked, but there is still a lot of work to be done. Home energy efficiency is not only a climate lever, but also an economic and social one. It reduces utility bills, cuts emissions, and makes cities more resilient. The challenge now is to move from the season of extraordinary bonuses to a stable strategy capable of accompanying over time the upgrading of an old, leaky building stock that is still too dependent on fossil fuels.
