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The Panama Canal connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific. Its creation was a huge boon for global shipping. Before the canal was completed, a ship had to travel around the southern tip of South America, a much longer and more dangerous route.

The sea around the stormy Cape Horn was a veritable ships' graveyard for centuries. Thousands of sailors died there and countless ships were lost. But the passage through the Panama Canal shortened the trip by more than 13,000 kilometers (8,000 miles), saving money and time.

First, what is an ? It's when the  has cold temperatures for a long time — millions to tens of millions of years — that lead to ice sheets and glaciers covering large areas of its surface.

We know that the Earth has had . The first one happened about 2 billion years ago and lasted about 300 million years. The most recent one started about 2.6 million years ago, and in fact, we are still technically in it.

Over the past three million years, the Earth has periodically plunged into an ice age. Although the planet is now in an inter-glacial period, the situation can change due to increased global temperatures, scientists say. Scientists at Cardiff University have found that melting Antarctic icebergs could trigger a chain reaction that plunges the Earth into a new ice age, The Daily Mail reported. As part of the research, the scientists studied rock fragments dropped in the ocean by melting icebergs and found out that they lead to changes in deep ocean circulation. The melting of Antarctic icebergs shifts a huge amount of fresh water from the Southern Ocean into the Atlantic. Thus, the Southern Ocean becomes saltier and the North Atlantic gets fresher, which leads to a change of the ocean circulation pattern. With such changes, carbon dioxide is pulled away from the atmosphere more quickly, reducing the so-called greenhouse effect and thus pushing the Earth into the new ice age. "Such a leading role for the Southern Ocean and Antarctica in global climate has been speculated but seeing it so clearly in geological evidence was very exciting," Aidan Starr, from the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Cardiff University, said. However, according to the scientists, the current increase in global temperatures may disrupt the ordinary ice age cycle because the Southern Ocean is likely to become warmer and prevent icebergs from travelling far enough to change ocean circulation patterns in a way that triggers an ice age.

However, the extra sea level rise on the east coast, the destruction of fisheries, and the alteration of nutrient cycling in the oceans poses real threats for us and for the ecosystems that support us. Regions like the Galapagos are so rich with life because they are fed by nutrient-rich, oxygenated deep water currents that originate in the poles, and a shutdown of this system could remove much of the nutrients sustaining these hotspots of life. Furthermore, any change in major planetary heat transport systems tends to have dramatic implications for our weather patterns. This could lead to stronger storms in the North Atlantic, reduced crop productivity in Europe, and changes in tropical precipitation patterns.  

The reality, however, is that we are not entirely sure how the slowing of AMOC is going to affect our world just yet. This is an extremely difficult system to predict: we still cannot accurately track fresh water as it incorporates into thermohaline circulation, or account for what could be caused by seasonal changes or by our own activities. But AMOC is slowing, and combined with the other factors changing our climate, we may have to adapt to some major shifts in the coming years.

Usually, when we think of going up in latitude, we think of climates getting colder.

But across the globe we see anomalies: in the winter, Toronto is a frigid hellscape while Barcelona, which shares the same latitude, still boasts nude beaches. The same goes for the strangely balmy coast of Ireland, which shares its latitude with Siberia, and even for Iceland (which, despite its name, experiences very mild winters), which is situated at the same latitude as Alaska. It turns out the reason behind all of these anomalies has to do with the ocean, which uses a system that transports heat, nutrients, and oxygen across the entire planet. This system, often referred to as the Great Ocean Conveyor Belt, is called thermohaline circulation. What would our world look like without this massive regulator, you ask? We may know soon.

Over the past three million years, the Earth has periodically plunged into an ice age. Although the planet is now in an inter-glacial period, the situation can change due to increased global temperatures, scientists say. Scientists at Cardiff University have found that melting Antarctic icebergs could trigger a chain reaction that plunges the Earth into a new ice age, The Daily Mail reported. As part of the research, the scientists studied rock fragments dropped in the ocean by melting icebergs and found out that they lead to changes in deep ocean circulation. The melting of Antarctic icebergs shifts a huge amount of fresh water from the Southern Ocean into the Atlantic. Thus, the Southern Ocean becomes saltier and the North Atlantic gets fresher, which leads to a change of the ocean circulation pattern. With such changes, carbon dioxide is pulled away from the atmosphere more quickly, reducing the so-called greenhouse effect and thus pushing the Earth into the new ice age. "Such a leading role for the Southern Ocean and Antarctica in global climate has been speculated but seeing it so clearly in geological evidence was very exciting," Aidan Starr, from the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Cardiff University, said. However, according to the scientists, the current increase in global temperatures may disrupt the ordinary ice age cycle because the Southern Ocean is likely to become warmer and prevent icebergs from travelling far enough to change ocean circulation patterns in a way that triggers an ice age

"Pink elephant in the room" time: There is no impending “ice age” or "mini ice age" if there's a reduction in the Sun’s energy output in the next several decades.

Through its lifetime, the Sun naturally goes through changes in energy output. Some of these occur over a regular 11-year period of peak (many sunspots) and low activity (fewer sunspots), which are quite predictable.

An ice age is a long interval of time (millions to tens of millions of years) when global temperatures are relatively cold and large areas of the Earth are covered by continental ice sheets and alpine glaciers. Within an ice age are multiple shorter-term periods of warmer temperatures when glaciers retreat (called interglacials or interglacial cycles) and colder temperatures when glaciers advance (called glacials or glacial cycles).

At least five major ice ages have occurred throughout Earth’s history: the earliest was over 2 billion years ago, and the most recent one began approximately 3 million years ago and continues today (yes, we live in an ice age!). Currently, we are in a warm interglacial that began about 11,000 years ago. The last period of glaciation, which is often informally called the “Ice Age,” peaked about 20,000 years ago. At that time, the world was on average probably about 10°F (5°C) colder than today, and locally as much as 40°F (22°C) colder.

As CO2 levels rise, so do carbohydrates in plants, increasing food’s sugar content. While carbon-enriched plants grow bigger, scientists are finding that they contain proportionately less protein and nutrients such as zinc, magnesium and calcium.

A meta-analysis of 7,761 observations of 130 plant species found that overall mineral concentrations in plants declined by about 8 percent in response to elevated CO2 levels — 25 minerals decreased, including iron, zinc, potassium and magnesium.

While the role of CO2 as a greenhouse gas in the context of global warming is widely acknowledged, additional data from multiple sources is demonstrating that rising CO2 of and by itself will have a tremendous effect on plant biology. This effect is widely recognized for its role in stimulating photosynthesis and growth for multiple plant species, including crops. However, CO2 is also likely to alter plant chemistry in ways that will denigrate plant nutrition. That role is also of tremendous importance, not only from a human health viewpoint, but also from a global foodweb perspective. Here, the goal is to review the current evidence, propose potential mechanistic explanations, provide an overview of critical unknowns and to elucidate a series of next steps that can address what is, overall, a critical but unappreciated aspect of anthropogenic climate change.

Popular images of climate change include starving polar bears, rising sea levels and super-charged hurricanes. All are instances of justified concerns regarding anthropogenic climate change. However, other impacts, as exemplified here by the extensive evidence indicating a wide-spread decline in nutritional concentration of numerous plant species with rising [CO2], will also have profound and wide-ranging effects on numerous aspects of global biology, not least of which is human nutrition. These effects are not trivial. Weyant et al. [58] estimated that CO2-induced reductions in micronutrients such as zinc and iron in crops could result in an additional 125.8 million disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) globally, with South-East Asian and sub-Saharan African countries most affected. Zhu et al. [50] estimated 600 million people at risk past mid-century are in the highest rice-consuming countries in Asia with the lowest overall gross domestic product per capita. Beach et al. [32] projected a 2.4% to 4.3% penalty on expected gains in global availability of protein, iron and zinc by mid-century because of technology change, market responses and the fertilization effects of [CO2] on yield. It is clear that understanding these effects is fundamental and crucial to estimate the consequences not only for public health, but also for the transfer and adequate functioning of the global food web.

It is puzzling and perplexing that in looking at available resources to both broaden the scope of our understanding and assess the global outcomes of [CO2] and nutrition, there is a profound lack of academic support and funding. No programs regarding [CO2] and human nutrition currently exist at the National Institute of Health (NIH) and no RFAs at the National Science Foundation (NSF) exist to examine the role of [CO2] on nutrition as part of the global food web; yet, these are agencies that, ostensibly, are designed to address significant scientific issues, in the public’s interest. As Howard Frumkin wrote in Scientific American [59], at present the total research funding on climate change for all health consequences is approximately nine million dollars, or 0.02% of the NIH’s 40-billion-dollar budget.

Global Warming Consequences and Threats to National Security and U.S. Foreign Policy

The DoD considers climate change as a threat to our national security and a complication to U.S. foreign policy. In 2016, The Center for Climate & Security stated the U.S. military has for years been a leader in addressing the risk to national security posed by climate change—a phenomenon that acts as a “threat multiplier,” exacerbating natural disasters, water, food and energy insecurities, contributing to conditions that can catalyze conflict, instability, and state failure, and exacerbating existing security risks … to U.S. national security, and potentially creating new ones.30

By not addressing climate change more aggressively and creatively, the United States is squandering an opportunity to secure its global primacy for the next few generations to come. To do this, though, the U.S. must rely on innovation to help the world escape the coming environmental meltdown. Developing the key technologies that will save the planet from global warming will allow the U.S. to outmaneuver potential great power rivals seeking to replace it as the international system's hegemon. But the greening of American strategy must occur soon. The U.S., however, seems to be stuck in time, unable to move beyond oil-centric geo-politics in any meaningful way. ADVERTISEMENT VMware The freedom of multiple clouds, without the complexity. Sponsored by VMware Tap into a full array of clouds and manage them as one with VMware Cross-Cloud services. LEARN MORE Often, the gridlock is portrayed as a partisan difference, with Republicans resisting action and Democrats pleading for action. This, though, is an unfair characterization as there are numerous proactive Republicans and quite a few reticent Democrats. The real divide is instead one between realists and liberals. Students of realpolitik, which still heavily guides American foreign policy, largely discount environmental issues as they are not seen as advancing national interests in a way that generates relative power advantages vis-à-vis the other major powers in the system: Russia, China, Japan, India, and the European Union. Liberals, on the other hand, have recognized that global warming might very well become the greatest challenge ever faced by mankind. As such, their thinking often eschews narrowly defined national interests for the greater global good. This, though, ruffles elected officials whose sworn obligation is, above all, to protect and promote American national interests. ADVERTISEMENT VMware What if you could manage all your clouds as one? Sponsored by VMware Get consistent infrastructure and operations across all your clouds with VMware Cross-Cloud services. LEARN MORE What both sides need to understand is that by becoming a lean, mean, green fighting machine, the U.S. can actually bring together liberals and realists to advance a collective interest which benefits every nation, while at the same time, securing America's global primacy well into the future. To do so, the U.S. must re-invent itself as not just your traditional hegemon, but as history's first ever green hegemon. Hegemons are countries that dominate the international system - bailing out other countries in times of global crisis, establishing and maintaining the most important international institutions, and covering the costs that result from free-riding and cheating global obligations. Since 1945, that role has been the purview of the United States. Immediately after World War II, Europe and Asia laid in ruin, the global economy required resuscitation, the countries of the free world needed security guarantees, and the entire system longed for a multilateral forum where global concerns could be addressed. The U.S., emerging the least scathed by the systemic crisis of fascism's rise, stepped up to the challenge and established the postwar (and current) liberal order. But don't let the world "liberal" fool you. While many nations benefited from America's new-found hegemony, the U.S. was driven largely by "realist" selfish national interests. The liberal order first and foremost benefited the U.S. ADVERTISEMENT VMware Multiple clouds, managed as one. Sponsored by VMware Establish consistent operations across all your clouds with VMware Cross-Cloud services. LEARN MORE With the U.S. becoming bogged down in places like Afghanistan and Iraq, running a record national debt, and failing to shore up the dollar, the future of American hegemony now seems to be facing a serious contest: potential rivals - acting like sharks smelling blood in the water - wish to challenge the U.S. on a variety of fronts. This has led numerous commentators to forecast the U.S.'s imminent fall from grace. Not all hope is lost however. With the impending systemic crisis of global warming on the horizon, the U.S. again finds itself in a position to address a transnational problem in a way that will benefit both the international community collectively and the U.S. selfishly. The current problem is two-fold. First, the competition for oil is fueling animosities between the major powers. The geopolitics of oil has already emboldened Russia in its 'near abroad' and China in far-off places like Africa and Latin America. As oil is a limited natural resource, a nasty zero-sum contest could be looming on the horizon for the U.S. and its major power rivals - a contest which threatens American primacy and global stability. Second, converting fossil fuels like oil to run national economies is producing irreversible harm in the form of carbon dioxide emissions. So long as the global economy remains oil-dependent, greenhouse gases will continue to rise. Experts are predicting as much as a 60% increase in carbon dioxide emissions in the next twenty-five years. That likely means more devastating water shortages, droughts, forest fires, floods, and storms. In other words, if global competition for access to energy resources does not undermine international security, global warming will. And in either case, oil will be a culprit for the instability. Oil arguably has been the most precious energy resource of the last half-century. But "black gold" is so 20th century. The key resource for this century will be green gold - clean, environmentally-friendly energy like wind, solar, and hydrogen power. Climate change leaves no alternative. And the sooner we realize this, the better off we will be. What Washington must do in order to avoid the traps of petropolitics is to convert the U.S. into the world's first-ever green hegemon. For starters, the federal government must drastically increase investment in energy and environmental research and development (E&E R&D). This will require a serious sacrifice, committing upwards of $40 billion annually to E&E R&D - a far cry from the few billion dollars currently being spent. By promoting a new national project, the U.S. could develop new technologies that will assure it does not drown in a pool of oil. Some solutions are already well known, such as raising fuel standards for automobiles; improving public transportation networks; and expanding nuclear and wind power sources. Others, however, have not progressed much beyond the drawing board: batteries that can store massive amounts of solar (and possibly even wind) power; efficient and cost-effective photovoltaic cells, crop-fuels, and hydrogen-based fuels; and even fusion. Such innovations will not only provide alternatives to oil, they will also give the U.S. an edge in the global competition for hegemony. If the U.S. is able to produce technologies that allow modern, globalized societies to escape the oil trap, those nations will eventually have no choice but to adopt such technologies. And this will give the U.S. a tremendous economic boom, while simultaneously providing it with means of leverage that can be employed to keep potential foes in check. ADVERTISEMENT VMware What if you could manage all your clouds as one? Sponsored by VMware Get consistent infrastructure and operations across all your clouds with VMware Cross-Cloud services. LEARN MORE The bottom-line is that the U.S. needs to become green energy dominant as opposed to black energy independent - and the best approach for achieving this is to promote a national strategy of greengemony.

A carbon tax can drive the deployment of technologies and innovation necessary to cut greenhouse gas emissions and combat climate change. And by getting the biggest environmental bang for our buck, a carbon tax makes the politics and economics of driving down emissions easier. By creating a strong profit incentive for businesses to seek out and exploit low-cost ways of cutting emissions, a carbon tax can be quite effective environmentally. As a transparent, administratively simple approach, a carbon tax represents good public policy, particularly within a highly partisan and politically divided democracy. As mentioned, a carbon tax would also act as a substitute for the rigid and complicated framework of command and control regulations that define the status quo. The absence of a single comprehensive, national climate policy has produced a vacuum, which has been filled by a patchwork of state policies, applications of decades-old statutes to specific sectors and emission sources, and technology-specific subsidies. This complicated suite of policies is not the path to a low-carbon economy; it is a collection of stopgap measures desperately awaiting more comprehensive, durable policy instruments that will truly get us there. We could say that the rationale for coupling a carbon tax and tax reform is, therefore, twofold. First, climate policy and tax reform benefit from each other in terms of economics. Tax reform would lower the costs to the economy—and potentially eliminates the net costs—of a carbon tax, while the carbon tax provides the revenues to finance the tax reform. Second, such an approach can broaden the political coalition that would derive a “win” from at least some element of the policy package. In isolation, a carbon tax may not necessarily appear politically appealing. But it may be preferable to a national sales tax, the elimination of the home mortgage interest deduction, or adding trillions of dollars to the national debt as a part of a tax reform (aimed at reducing income and corporate taxes). Building a broad political coalition would ensure the durability of the carbon tax and tax reform. Implementing a U.S. carbon tax would also highlight American leadership on a globally important issue, while reversing existing climate change policies without a credible alternative raises questions about the U.S. commitment to the Paris Agreement (or simply to any international agreement). The key elements of the Paris Agreement represent long-standing U.S. interests: a respect for sovereignty, by allowing each country to combat climate change as it so chooses, while maintaining a focus on transparency in implementation to assess whether all major partners undertake comparable efforts. Even if global climate policy is not a first-tier priority of the new Administration, the fact that it is a top priority for many countries around the world provides a potential leverage point for the United States in other bilateral or multilateral negotiating contexts. Since the climate agreement is part of a complex web of international relations, U.S. engagement in it can facilitate efforts to secure deals on the incoming Administration’s foreign policy priorities. Walking away from the Paris Agreement, on the other hand, would make it much more difficult for the incoming Administration to work with other countries on issues ranging from terrorism, to trade, to cybersecurity, to public health and pandemics, as well as an array of other bilateral issues. For all these reasons, a great swap—taxing pollution more and income less, while streamlining environmental regulation and compliance costs, would be good politics and good policy. For President Trump, it presents a Nixon-to-China opportunity, in this case to break the stalemate over energy and climate.

Greater yield from the land, less water consumption for irrigation, the pursuit of energy independence and the revitalization of farming activities in areas that are currently low in profitability: these are only some of the benefits linked to the synergy between agricultural production and energy production. The integration of agriculture with standard photovoltaic systems gives rise to positive effects and generates mutual benefits, for crop cultivation and for the production of solar energy. The first to benefit from these advantages are farmers, for whom can prove to be an invaluable ally, even in economic terms, because additional income resulting from crop management integrated with renewable projects can then be reinvested in agricultural enterprises. Higher income and better performance When we talk about agrivoltaics, we mean a large-scale photovoltaic system, with structures that support the photovoltaic modules at a height of about 2-2.5 meters. These modules are located on land where agricultural or livestock farming can also be developed, with complete integration and synergy between electricity and agriculture. This model therefore enables agriculture and sustainable energy to coexist and generates extra income for farmers. Several tests, carried out at plants in Spain, Greece, Australia and the United States, have shown an increase in productivity on land where agrivoltaic systems are present. Thanks to agrivoltaics, farms improve their performance. First of all, water consumption can decrease by up to 20% as a result of partial and intermittent shading of the photovoltaic modules. In this way, the soil retains more moisture and the crops are protected from excessive sunlight especially during the hottest hours of the day. In addition, the use of high-tech sensors makes agrivoltaics a platform for enabling sustainable and efficient agricultural practices, because they supply useful information to improve farming. For example, the monitoring of nutrients provides data on the use of water and fertilizers, increasing the competitiveness of farms. Agrivoltaics in alliance with the environment As a general rule, the crops that reap the most benefits from the synergy between agriculture and photovoltaic systems are low-medium crops, such as aromatic herbs like rosemary, sage and green tea; vegetables like peppers, eggplants and zucchini; forage plants; fruit like strawberries or dragon fruit; and succulent plants like aloe vera that are grown for cosmetics or pharmaceutical use. Many advantages have been reported for these plants. On the one hand, tests have highlighted an increase in yield from 20% to 60% in the land used for photovoltaic systems. On the other, some varieties of these plants, such as forage, aromatic and medicinal, are strategically selected in order to help create a suitable habitat for pollinating insects, whose activity brings benefits to the whole agricultural ecosystem and protects biodiversity. In the livestock sector, the integration of sheep farming is now a common practice, due to its strong compatibility and non-interference with the photovoltaic system. Revitalizing the land Building an agrivoltaic system is certainly one way to counteract abandonment of land; what’s more, agrivoltaics can also offer new opportunities for social development for the entire community. In particular, this can be achieved through the involvement of experts in the field, for example agronomists and agricultural enterprises, as well as universities and research centers, in order to promote new opportunities and ways to collaborate. A further example of this approach is the project in our photovoltaic park in Vamvakies, Greece, set up in collaboration with the non-profit organizations Wise Greece and CluBE. The project, which won the “Bravo Sustainability Award”, offered a group of unemployed local women the opportunity to become food producers by cultivating the land around the solar panels, becoming the first example of agrivoltaics of this type in Greece. Furthermore, the initiative also had an educational and social role, providing free courses in the area around Kozani for potential entrepreneurs who wanted to acquire digital and marketing skills. Thanks to the project, it was therefore possible to support the communities, creating concrete opportunities for employment and professional growth.

Sometimes, the most innovative solutions are actually rooted in the past. It's precisely in this spirit that Enel Green Power has decided to deal with the issue of soil erosion and hydrogeological instability, a process which is occurring more and more often, largely due to increasing levels of deforestation, overbuilding and urbanization – and the situation is likely to worsen with . Slopes, road and railroad embankments, river and stream banks, degraded areas, quarries, mines and landfills are all places where the consequences of soil erosion are commonly found. But the issue can also cause problems where facilities are located, because although the construction of such sites takes into consideration the various pedological, agronomic and geotechnical conditions of the soil, it is still possible for the soil conditions to change over time. It is for this reason that EGP is testing a new solution to tackle soil erosion, one that is actually very old and entirely natural: a seed mix consisting of several deep-rooting herbaceous plants. These are non-GMO plants with roots that can reach up to 4-5 meters in length; they are resistant to aridity, able to adapt to any type of soil, with various degrees of acidity (pH), and in any climate, and able to withstand temperatures ranging from -40°C to +60°C. These non-invasive herbaceous plants are also capable of capturing up to 400% more carbon dioxide than other types of plants. This natural, sustainable “invention”, which utilizes none of the geopolymers, techniques or products that are typically associated with hydraulic engineering, was devised by an Italian company that has chosen a decidedly evocative name for itself: (literally meaning “Reinforced Meadows”). The herbaceous plant seeds are carefully selected according to the area in which they are to be used and their compatibility with the local flora. Once sown, they take root easily thanks to the sowing method used: they're “sprayed” onto the ground inside an aqueous solution, which acts as a sort of natural glue. EGP's Operation & Maintenance team have already used this approach, employing it in 2018 to combat soil erosion at the Maida facility in Calabria, Italy. Now the Innovation EGP team is looking to test it in off-limits cases, because successful testing could open the way for the approach to be adopted across the entire Group. To this end, the first innovative use of this approach concerned an area adjacent to a penstock of the Narzole , in the province of Cuneo. The area of land where the successful test was carried out is particularly steep and devoid of vegetation. However, with woods and truffle grounds located in the surrounding environment, it was necessary to experiment with a totally natural solution that would respect all other vegetation. Testing will continue over the next several months at other sites. At the wind power facility, in Molise, which is currently under construction, the aim of the operation will be to mitigate the impact of the road infrastructure being built on lime stabilized embankments, thus enabling it to better integrate into the agricultural environment. The Prati Armati® slogan is “Nature saves itself.” And, indeed, this solution minimizes the risks associated with hydrogeological instability, stabilizes slopes which are a landslide risk, and makes the natural landscape once again hospitable to life, thus preserving . It can also act as a containment measure, thanks to phytocapping, for the remediation of contaminated areas by isolating contaminated materials or soils from the surrounding environment and storm water. Furthermore, it's an entirely maintenance-free technology. The herbaceous plants do not require cutting, they grow in depth but not so much in height, and can also serve as food for livestock without the need for seeds to be resown.

News coverage in 2021 was frequently dominated by reports of massive, seemingly unstoppable wildfires spreading all over the globe. Almost always caused by humans, these fires were further fueled by global warming, which is causing increasingly extreme climate phenomena, like terrible droughts. This has been happening in California and the western United States, Canada, and even Siberia, with fire fronts spanning hundreds of kilometers – but it is also happening in the Mediterranean, from Italy to Turkey to Greece, in central-southern Africa and the Amazon basin. As we well know, and as the latest report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has confirmed, reducing emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases is the best way to combat climate change. This is why we are committed to the towards a zero-emissions future, through the development of multiple plants. , and renewable energy plants in general are also important allies in fighting wildfires. Recently, in Pucheruelo, Spain, near Avila, it was wind farms themselves that acted as a barrier against the flames, allowing firefighters’ vehicles to pass and preventing the town of San Juan from being engulfed in flames. Spain has plenty of experience in this field: in the last twenty years, our wind farms have helped control and extinguish many fires, including those in Barbanza, Corzán and Couto de San Sebastián, to name just a few of the most important ones. Meanwhile in Brazil, at the solar plants of Ituverava and Horizonte, located in the semi-arid Nordeste (Brazil’s northeastern region, which often experiences wildfires), Enel Green Power has supported the creation of groups of volunteers that participate in firefighting operations alongside firefighters by offering training courses and technical support, such as personal protective equipment, and providing them with a headquarters. This initiative is aligned with United Nations Development Goal (SDG) 15, protecting terrestrial ecosystems, and Goal 17, promoting partnerships with civil society. In Italy, a thermal fuse is being tested: installed in , it signals and prevents overheating, protecting the system and its surrounding environment. It’s being tested in Sicily at the windfarms of Caltavuturo 1 and 2, Cerda, Gangi, Montemaggiore Belsito and Sclafani Bagni Est Ovest (Palermo); Carlentini 2 (Syracuse) and Nicosia (Enna). Another important resource are bike paths, which are frequently built alongside renewable plants, as has been the case in the United States and Greece, and in other countries as well. Bike paths not only support sustainable tourism and contribute to creating shared value for the territory, they also act as firebreaks, mitigating the effects of wildfires. Renewable energy plants therefore act as a widespread and comprehensive protection against fires, and thus increase the safety of the surrounding areas, for the benefit of all.

Accelerating the transition to renewable sources, in order to protect the climate and reduce the dependence of individual countries on imported fossil fuels, is a path that Enel has been on for several years now. But it is also a choice that must be strengthened today, in order to overcome the “turbulence” of the last few years, as Group CEO Francesco Starace described it. First the Covid-19 pandemic and then the conflict in Ukraine, along with global supply chain difficulties and soaring gas prices: all of these factors are combining to affect everything from people’s quality of life to international development. In the meantime, extreme weather events linked to global warming have intensified, because the climate will not wait for us. Changing the way we produce energy also helps to ensure freedom and energy independence for Italy and the countries in which we operate. This is the commitment set out by our Group in its , presented in Milan on November 22 during Capital Markets Day, the annual event at which CEO Francesco Starace and CFO Alberto De Paoli outlined the details of our plan to the financial world. Stability against volatility. Security against uncertainty. Energy independence, guaranteed by production from renewable sources, and affordability for consumers. These are the key elements of what Starace described as a “strategic repositioning” which aims to create a leaner corporate structure to better tackle future challenges. Enel Green Power has the essential task of implementing this strategy by significantly strengthening renewable capacity over the next three years. Sustainable electrification and renewables The choice, said Starace, is to “concentrate our efforts where they matter most”, so our strategic plan is centered around a series of clear and precise goals for 2025. To achieve these goals, the Group expects to invest around €37 billion. The first goal involves sustainable electrification, a process that we will accelerate in our “core” countries: Italy, Spain, the United States, Brazil, Chile and Colombia, until we produce 90% of electricity sold at a fixed price from renewable sources, bringing clean energy generation to 75% of the total (as opposed to the current 55%) and digitalizing 80% of grid customers. End-use electrification will range from increasing the number of electric vehicle charging points (from around 0.4 million in 2022 to 1.4 million in 2025), to expanding storage capacity from 99 to 352 MW and to increasing demand-response capacity, which is expected to rise from the present 8.4 to 12.4 GW by the end of the three-year period. We will also significantly bolster installed renewable capacity with an additional 21 GW (including 4 GW of batteries for electricity storage). Out of the total 21 GW, 9 will be in Europe and 10 will be in the United States and Latin America, thanks to long-term PPAs, contracts that regulate the provision of electric energy between a producer and a purchaser. Another 2 GW will go to expanding markets thanks to the stewardship business model, which promotes third-party investments in partnership with Enel, or in the context of investment platforms. This will bring the Group’s total consolidated renewable capacity to around 75 GW by the end of 2025, supported by one of the most extensive pipelines in the world. More autonomy in the supply chain and fewer greenhouse gases The stewardship model – the involvement of other financial and industrial partners – will also be applied to facilitate the strategic restructuring of some of our supply chains in key areas. The best example is, our solar panel gigafactory in Sicily which is set to increase production from 200 MW to 3000 MW a year, while also improving panel efficiency by almost a third. It’s an initiative that will contribute to an increasingly widespread use of renewables and which, Starace says, “will reduce our dependency on Asia for this type of technology – something which hasn’t negatively affected us yet, but which potentially risks doing so if we don’t make an effort to become more independent.” The investment will also create around 1,000 new jobs, and Starace confirmed during Capital Markets Day that plans are already in the works for a 3Sun “sister” factory to be built in the United States. Our goal, of course, remains focused on decarbonization and Zero Emissions. The end goal – the elimination of our greenhouse gas emissions – is scheduled for 2040. In the meantime, however, we expect a drop in the so-called Scope 1 emissions (direct emissions generated by our company) to 130 grams of CO2 equivalent per KWh by 2025 compared to the current figure of 223, which will then fall to 82 in 2030. As regards gas sales (which will end in 2040), Scope 3 emissions (indirect emissions which occur from sources not owned or controlled by our company) will fall to 20.9 gCO2E/KWh from the current 24.1. For some years now, our Group has been on a path towards clean electrification, clearly a winning choice in light of the current crisis and also an area of growth for the future. We will increase “our resilience, and position our value creation for further growth, benefitting all our stakeholders and accelerating energy independence in our ‘core’ countries,” explained Starace. “Sustainability, which is fully integrated in all our decisions, continues to be the foundation of our strategy, while also leveraging the acceleration of electrification across all economies.”

The increase in electricity prices we’ve seen in Italy since the last quarter is mostly due to the rise in the cost of natural gas internationally. As the economy restarts, production cycles have surged and gas demand has increased to levels the system is still not prepared to meet, even considering the fact that Italy imports over 90% of this resource from abroad. Since more than half of the electricity in Italy is generated using gas, there is an even stronger connection between the two. And two additional factors come into play: the cost of CO2 emission allowances recording a steep increase; and the effects of climate change, which have noticeably increased energy consumption by end users. These factors cause the cost of energy production to rise significantly. This dynamic, however, can be interrupted thanks to , which have already proven to be able to provide greater stability in the market. Between 2009 and 2019, the cost of gas generation in Italy remained relatively unchanged, while the price of wholesale electricity decreased by approximately 19% thanks to the growth of renewables. So even if the share of electricity generated using renewable energy sources were higher, there would be no significant increase in prices for end users. In fact, as Nicola Lanzetta, our Head of Country Italy, explained in an interview with MF-Milano Finanza, “With production from renewable sources near 70%, which is the target for 2030, the cost of energy would be more than 30% lower. But already today, with the green energy quota in Italy at less than 50%, renewables have contained current prices rises by at least 10%.” In other words, electricity prices are increasing today because the share generated from renewable sources is still marginal. The competitive advantage of renewables lies first and foremost in technological innovation and, in particular, in research on materials – which has made it possible to lower production costs in wind and solar plants. But an important role is also played by internal factors and market instruments like (Power Purchase Agreements), which grant a long-term electricity supply at set rates. As Tamburi explains, “with renewables, it’s easier to enter into long-term supply agreements with PPA contracts. Now that we’re seeing a sharp rise in wholesale prices, there’s obviously an increased interest in fixing prices for the medium-long term.” So, this is another way in which renewables contribute to price stability. In the future, the financial advantages of renewable sources for end consumers will be even more striking. This is mainly because generation costs for wind and solar plants are destined to fall even further, but it’s also due to renewables’ intrinsic characteristics: they don’t involve any costs for extraction or for transportation infrastructure. Furthermore, a country like Italy – endowed with scarce deposits of raw materials, yet rich in natural resources provided by the sun and wind – would decrease its import expenditure, its dependency on countries that produce fossil fuels, and market competition from other nations. Finally, from an energy transition perspective, fossil fuels will be increasingly impacted by the costs of greenhouse gas emission allowances – making clean energy sources even more competitive. If we expand our vision even further, a cleaner energy mix at the global level can counteract the effects of and therefore reduce the huge financial – not to mention social – costs caused by weather events that unavoidably lead to an increased demand for energy, recording consumption peaks when temperatures fall below average in spring and rise above average in summer. Ultimately, the benefits of renewables for Italy, even in purely economic terms, are not limited to our individual energy bills but impact the entire country as a whole.

To combat , which causes increasingly frequent extreme weather events, fossil fuels (like coal, oil, natural gas) must be rapidly replaced with renewable energy sources (like , , , ) which do not produce CO2. with energy from is the best solution to create a clean, reliable and affordable energy system and is already available today, thanks to a combination of recent technological advances and cost reductions. Lower prices, higher efficiency According to the (IEA), the levelized costs of electricity (LCOE) of solar and wind technologies have continued to fall for a decade and are now significantly lower than conventional fossil fuel costs. This trend has remained unchanged even over the past year, despite the raw materials crisis following the Covid-19 pandemic, according to the (IRENA). The use of electricity as an energy carrier also increases efficiency. Electric vehicles, for example, are three to five times more efficient than those with an internal combustion engine. In the residential-building sector, efficiency can increase with the use of heat pumps, which use four times less energy than oil or gas boilers. In industry, energy intensity decreases thanks to the of processes and with the introduction of such as , which is also produced from renewable sources. Electricity also allows the through the integration of intelligent technologies in order to manage the grids and balance the system using storage systems, optimizing energy consumption and reducing waste. The benefits extend to everyone: citizens become more aware of their energy consumption thanks to digital devices that make their energy bills more transparent and improve customer service, while the electricity system evolves towards higher efficiency standards. Breathing better air Air pollution is one of the main environmental and health problems in densely urbanized areas. However, switching to electricity also improves air quality, since it cuts down on emissions of pollutants such as fine particles, mainly caused by fossil fuels that are burned to power cars and to heat buildings. A truly smart city is a place where electric vehicles circulate, buildings are equipped with , the heating of houses is powered by heat pumps, electricity is used to cook and to heat water, and lighting systems are adjusted by sensors according to the presence or absence of people in a room. Electrification boosts renewable energy communities and the circular economy The electrification of consumption is the best way to promote the development of : associations made up of citizens, businesses, small and medium-sized enterprises, and public administrations, which independently produce and manage green energy at affordable rates, thanks to shared renewable energy systems that feed the energy produced directly into the electricity grid and significantly reduce CO2 emissions and energy waste. Electrification from renewable sources also plays an essential role in promoting and supporting the . The components of e-vehicle batteries, storage systems, solar panels, transformers, the transmission networks themselves and all the equipment used can be collected and reused, promoting a virtuous circle that transforms waste into new raw materials.