Bergamo, Parma, Prato and Rome have already worked together on energy and water resource issues: first in the preparation and implementation of their respective Climate City Contracts, then also as partners within the Italian pilot project Let’sGOv.
The idea of collaborating to make districts more sustainable — thereby accelerating the path toward carbon neutrality — emerged during one of the first meetings among the Italian cities involved in the Missione UE of 100 cities (later increased to 112) experimenting with climate neutrality by 2030.
All four cities involved in the NZD project have a district within them, each with different characteristics. This heterogeneity represents added value, because it allows both an in-depth and comparative analysis of best practices to be replicated and a shared process of designing new policies and new governance models applicable to a variety of contexts.
This is one of the main strengths of the proposal: the exchange between territories, the growth of awareness, the identification of common obstacles and possible solutions, and multi-level governance capable of connecting multiple regions.
The Porta Sud district is one of the strategic areas of Bergamo's urban transformation: a large currently underutilized context, located along the railway axis and destined to become a new intermodal hub thanks to the redevelopment of the station, the future tram line, the rail connection to the airport, and innovative electric transport systems. Alongside the new infrastructure, a mixed-use neighborhood will emerge, with public spaces, greenery, residences, services, and productive functions, designed according to energy efficiency and environmental quality criteria.
Within Net Zero Districts, Porta Sud becomes a pilot case to experiment with an innovative model of governance and assessment of the climate impact of urban transformations. The project develops a replicable methodology that integrates data, regulations, and environmental indicators into a digital tool capable of measuring the climate effects of interventions and supporting the administration's future decisions.
Parma's eco-district is located in the Parma Nord productive area – Società Parmense per gli Insediamenti Produttivi (SPIP), one of the city's main industrial hubs, with over 6,000 workers and 127 companies in strategic sectors. Established in the early 1900s and planned since the 1970s, the district now occupies a key position north of the A1 highway and also hosts the integrated environmental hub connected to district heating. Since 2019, thanks to the Committee for the Regeneration of the North Productive Area, SPIP has been evolving into an industrial eco-district, oriented toward sustainability, renewable energy, smart mobility, circular economy, and new shared services. Among the solutions under study are the installation of solar panels on rooftops, the development of an eco-park, the strengthening of local public transport, and interventions to reduce impermeable surfaces in parking lots and paved areas.
In the Net Zero Districts project, the area becomes a laboratory to accelerate the ecological transition in line with the Climate City Contract, integrating technical and social innovation.
The Prato textile district is one of Italy's most significant industrial hubs and an international reference point in the production of wool yarns and fabrics. With over 6,600 companies and exports exceeding 2.6 billion euros, it represents an extensive and polycentric production system, distributed across 12 municipalities among Prato, Pistoia and Florence. Since the nineteenth century, the territory has developed a pioneering circular economy model based on textile waste recovery, still one of its main distinctive features today. In recent decades, the district has undergone profound transformations: the liberalization of global trade and the growth of fast fashion linked to the Chinese community have reshaped the economic and social structure, while maintaining the centrality of the textile sector. Alongside progressive tertiarization, manufacturing remains specialized but faces crucial challenges, such as high energy consumption and industrial buildings requiring structural and technological modernization.
Through NZD, Prato aims to strengthen governance, skills, and shared tools to accelerate an ecological transition capable of supporting the district's competitiveness, building on experiences already underway in energy efficiency, renewables, and integrated resource management.
The Tiburtina Valley is an area with a strong industrial and technological vocation along Via Tiburtina and the Aniene River, in the Municipality of Rome (up to Settecamini) and in the municipalities of Guidonia Montecelio and Tivoli. Although not a formally recognized district or consortium, it concentrates high-tech companies, particularly in the aerospace, defense, electronics and ICT sectors, as well as logistics activities favored by the main road and rail axes. It hosts the Roman Agri-food Center and the Tiburtino Technopole, where over 100 SMEs operate in the electronics, telecommunications, aerospace, green economy and research sectors. The area, included among those eligible for regional incentives (art. 107.3.c), is seeing growing interest from companies to coordinate development to capture economies of scale and production synergies.
For the Tiburtina production area, important opportunities are now opening up both on the energy front and in water resource management to overcome historical problems. Self-production from renewable sources and energy sharing among companies are now competitive innovations that allow for efficient energy management and cost reduction in a logic not only of individual companies but of the district, which can see an active role from the electricity distribution company Areti.
The Agency for Energy and Sustainable Development is a legally recognized non-profit association that works for sustainable energy development in the territory to support its members (over 150 Public Administrations). Founded in 1999 with support from the European SAVE II program, AESS is part of FEDARENE, the main European network of regional and local organizations for energy and environment, and coordinates the National Network of Local Energy Agencies (RENAEL). AESS is an association recognized by ANAC as an "In-house Entity of its members" and is certified according to UNI CEI 11352 Standard. It is also recognized as a Center for Innovation and Technology Transfer of the Emilia-Romagna Region and a member of the Clust-ER Construction and Energy.
AESS, in addition to serving as the technical partner of NZD, has supported, since the beginning of the journey toward climate neutrality of NetZeroCities, five of the nine "Mission Cities" (Bergamo, Bologna, Padua, Parma, Rome) in drafting the Climate City Contracts and obtaining the Mission Labels.
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