Data-center law in Italy

D.L. 21/2026, art. 8, conv. con modificazioni dalla L. 49/2026

Effective 2026-02-21 · Applies to both

Article 8 creates a single authorisation for the construction, expansion or operation of a data centre falling within the classes set by Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2024/1364, covering the facility together with its connection networks of any voltage: it is released, within a single procedure, by the authority already competent to issue the integrated environmental authorisation under Article 7, commi 4-bis and 4-ter of Decreto Legislativo 152/2006, in place of separately run VIA and AIA tracks.

The single procedure runs no longer than ten months from the date the application is found complete, environmental-impact assessment deadlines within it are halved, and the ten-month term may be extended only for exceptional circumstances and by no more than three months.

Where a data centre needs a connection above 220 kV and the project already held its authorisations when this decree took effect, the region where the connection works are sited is the authority for authorising those works rather than the single-window authority.

Source: Full text of law

Decreto Legislativo 3 aprile 2006, n. 152, Parte Seconda, Titolo I (artt. 4-10) e Titolo III (artt. 19-29)

Effective 2006-08-12 · Applies to both

Article 6, comma 2, letter a) requires strategic environmental assessment (VAS) of plans and programmes for sectors including energy, industry and telecommunications that frame the approval, authorisation, siting or realisation of the projects listed in the decree's Allegati II, II-bis, III and IV. Project-level environmental impact assessment (VIA) applies to the projects in Allegati II and III (comma 7, letter a).

Screening (verifica di assoggettabilità a VIA) applies to the projects in Allegato II-bis, within the criteria and thresholds set by ministerial decree (comma 6, letter c). Where a screening rather than a full VIA applies, Article 19 sets the procedure. The proponent submits a preliminary environmental study electronically, in the format set by Allegato IV-bis, with proof of the Article 33 fee (comma 1).

The competent authority checks completeness within five days and may ask once for clarifications, on pain of the application being deemed refused if the proponent misses the fifteen-day deadline to respond (comma 2); it then publishes the study on its own website, notifies potentially interested administrations and territorial bodies (comma 3), and gives any interested party thirty days from that publication to submit observations (comma 4).

The authority may, once, ask the proponent within fifteen days of that deadline for further clarifications aimed at avoiding a full VIA, giving up to thirty days to respond, again on pain of deemed refusal (comma 6). The authority must adopt its screening decision within sixty days of the observation deadline, or within forty-five days of receiving the requested clarifications (comma 6-bis).

This procedural timeline, most recently amended in 2024, applies to any project meeting an Allegato threshold, including a large civil-engineering or industrial installation; whether an annex names data centres specifically is not established here.

Source: Full text of law

D.Lgs. 152/2006, art. 96 (sostituisce R.D. 1775/1933, artt. 7 e 17)

Effective 2006-04-29 · Applies to both

Any withdrawal or use of public water requires an authorisation or concession from the competent authority, reaching a data centre's cooling or process water intake on the same terms as any other user. The derivation requirement carries an exemption for rainwater collected at a single building or agricultural holding.

A concession application must also be forwarded to the competent river-basin authority, which, within forty days of receipt for a small derivation, communicates a binding opinion to the competent office on the application's compatibility with the water-protection plan. Where resources drawn from springs or aquifers, or otherwise reserved for human consumption, are allowed for a use other than drinking, the usage fee for that non-potable use is tripled.

Source: Full text of law

D.P.R. 380/2001, art. 10

Effective 2003-06-30 · Applies to both

Article 10, comma 1, letter a) subjects any new-construction intervention to a building permit (permesso di costruire), reaching the construction of a data-centre building on the same terms as any other new building.

A region may by law identify further interventions subject to the permit given their impact on the territory and urban load, and may determine which uses of an existing building, whether or not tied to physical transformation, require a permit or a certified start-of-activity notice instead.

Source: Full text of law

D.L. 19/2024, art. 38, conv. con modificazioni dalla L. 56/2024

Effective 2024-03-02 · Applies to private

The Transizione 5.0 tax credit rewards a capital investment in new tangible or intangible assets that cuts an enterprise's energy consumption, and the credit may also be claimed by an accredited energy-service company (ESCo) in place of the enterprise, for the innovation project it carries out at the client's premises. The credit applies to new investments made from 1 January 2024 to 31 December 2025 in production facilities located in Italy.

The final date for completing an investment that earns the credit was 31 December 2025. Credit not yet used by that date carries forward and is usable in five equal annual instalments. The credit runs 35 percent of cost for the investment tranche up to 10 million euros and 5 percent for the tranche above it and up to 50 million euros per beneficiary enterprise per year.

Those rates rise to 40 and 10 percent respectively where the investment cuts the production facility's energy consumption by more than 6 percent. The eligible cost base expressly extends to cloud-computing resources billed by usage. The statute does not name a data centre; whether a given data-centre capital investment qualifies turns on whether it meets the credit's own energy-reduction and asset-eligibility tests.

Source: Full text of law