The Blue Book is an yearly report by Fondazione Utilitatis and Utilitalia exploring in depth the current situation of the water industry in Italy, highlighting all major challenges, analyzing the most promising solutions and innovations and providing a strategic view on the near future.
In the 2025 issue, which anticipates the 2026 publication, Hypercube’s water credit standard was identified as a key potential integration to the Blue Certificates law draft that was recently presented. The water resource, according to a note by Utilitalia, is currently threatened by climate change, pollution and increasing consumption. Italy, with an average withdrawal of 30 billion cubic meters of water per year, is among the most water-demanding European countries, allocating 56% of the water to agriculture, 31% to civil use, and 13% to industry, while losses in distribution networks average more than 42% of the water supplied.
“The integrated water service represents only one-third of water withdrawals: consequently, identifying incentives that encourage the reduction of withdrawals, especially for predominant uses, corresponds to the objectives of resource protection in line with the new European Water Resilience Strategy. In this context, Blue Certificates can serve as an important incentive for transforming production cycles toward a lower water footprint,” explains Barbara Marinali, Vice President of Utilitalia.
Certification tools and environmental credit trading applied to the water sector, the note continues, already exist in some countries around the world, such as Australia, Chile, Peru, and Switzerland. At least two possible models exist:
- certificates for water savings inspired by the “white certificates” system for energy efficiency, which reward measures to reduce consumption and encourage reuse with public funds;
- voluntary water credits, created to promote alternative water resources and projects aimed at protecting and restoring the resource through a non-debt financial model inspired by carbon credits.
“Italy needs innovative tools to incentivize the sustainable management of water resources. The so-called Blue Certificates could represent an interesting model: they would make it possible to reward concrete measures to reduce losses, reuse water, and improve plant efficiency. If properly regulated, these tools can mobilize public and private investments, strengthen the governance of utilities, and help make our water system more resilient, particularly in Southern areas, where infrastructure requires urgent interventions,” notes Mario Rosario Mazzola, President of Fondazione Utilitatis.
The proposal for Blue Certificates, Utilitalia explains, has already generated political and institutional interest, with parliamentary initiatives and favorable positions from the Ministry of the Environment and MASAF aimed at creating a national fund to support water efficiency and reuse, particularly in the irrigation sector. The success of the model, it states, will depend on the ability to coordinate institutions, Regions, service providers, businesses, and agriculture, and to ensure transparency, fairness, and the actual measurability of water savings.
https://utilitatis.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/QBB4_Bluecert.pdf