Statistical information on environmental taxes can be broken down by tax category, corresponding units, environmental activity category, and revenue destination. In Italy, environmental taxes will amount to €62.4 billion in 2025 (+3.1% compared to the previous year). In 2025, environmental tax revenue will correspond to 6.4% of total taxes and social security contributions and approximately 3% of gross domestic product.

In 2023, total Italian spending on environmental protection will amount to €52.9 billion, equal to 2.5% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). This figure remained essentially stable over the 2016–2023 period, signaling continued investment in environmental protection. Resources are primarily used for waste management and wastewater management, which represent the two largest expenditure items (46% and 26%, respectively). These are accompanied, to a lesser but still significant extent, by interventions to protect and remediate soil, groundwater, and surface water, safeguard biodiversity and landscape, protect air and climate, as well as noise and vibration abatement (excluding workplaces). Expenditure on environmental research and development and other support activities, which contribute to the dissemination of innovative and sustainable solutions and other environmental objectives, complete the picture.

Domestic material consumption measures an economy's apparent consumption of material resources. It is the main indicator derived from material flow accounts, used to measure a country's resource productivity as part of its natural resource policies. In 2025, Italian domestic material consumption will amount to 511 million tons (+2.8% compared to the previous year), and resource productivity will stand at €3.61/kg (-2.2% compared to the previous year).

The indicator quantifies the extraction of natural resources—biomass, metal ores, non-metallic minerals, and fossil fuels—globally, driven by final consumption and investments by households, businesses, and public administration in Italy. Italy has structurally reduced its material footprint, going from 17.8 to 11 tonnes per capita between 2008 and 2025, lower than the EU average (14.3 tonnes per capita). This result highlights significant progress in terms of efficiency and circularity. However, to ensure this competitive advantage is sustainable, the decoupling between economic growth and resource consumption must be consolidated.

The Circular Material Use Rate (CMUR) measures  the share of material resources reused by an economy. In the period 2004-2024 the rate of circular use of Italian materials goes from 5.8% to 21.6%

The indicator quantifies the environmental impact of Italian consumption through 16 indicators based on the life cycle (LCA). In the period 2010-2024, the national consumption footprint index recorded a reduction of 8% (dropping from 100 to 92), compared to a 6% increase in the EU-27 average. However, analyzing the trend per inhabitant, Italy's single score, despite having dropped from approximately 0.98 pt to 0.91 pt, remains constantly higher than the European average (which went from 0.82 pt to 0.85 pt), highlighting an environmental pressure per capita that is still high compared to the community context. The objective is to monitor the decoupling between consumption and impacts to fall within planetary limits.

The indicator on the Environmental Goods and Services Sector (EGSS) measures the economic and employment contribution of production activities dedicated to environmental protection and the sustainable management of natural resources. In recent years, the environmental goods and services sector has experienced strong growth, highlighting the dynamism of Italy's green economy. Between 2016 and 2023, employment in the sector more than doubled, while gross value added (GVA) increased by 122.5%, with particularly strong expansion during the last three years. Between 2021 and 2023, the value added generated by environmental activities grew by 41.7%, substantially outpacing the overall growth of the Italian economy (GDP: +4%). As a result, the contribution of the environmental goods and services sector to the national economy increased from 3.1% of GDP in 2021 to 3.7% in 2023, confirming the growing importance of sustainability-oriented production activities in Italy.

In 2024, the seventh edition of the Catalogue of Environmentally Harmful and Environmentally Beneficial Subsidies identified a total of 191 subsidy measures (compared with 183 in 2022). These included EUR 25.4 billion in Environmentally Harmful Subsidies (EHS), a record EUR 71.8 billion in Environmentally Beneficial Subsidies (EBS), and EUR 26.3 billion in Uncertain Environmental Impact  Subsidies (UEIS). Among environmentally harmful subsidies, those supporting fossil fuels amounted to EUR 19.6 billion in 2024.

The indicator analyzes the commercial flows of recyclable materials, highlighting a growth trend of 20% in cross-border movements in the period 2004–2024 (from 12.9 to 15.5 million tonnes). The increase in intra-EU imports stands out (+34.5%), essential for the metallurgical and manufacturing sectors, and the strong expansion of extra-EU exports (+83.4%). In 2024, the national system absorbed 12.7 million tonnes of imports, dominated by ferrous metals (5.9 million tonnes), while it contributed to the global supply with 2.8 million tonnes exported, of which approximately half was made up of paper and cardboard. These dynamics reflect the consolidation of Italian circular supply chains, in full coherence with the European objectives of resource efficiency and reduction of the use of virgin raw materials.

From 2005 to 2023, in Italy, the circular economy sector showed signs of economic strengthening, with an increase in value added (+0.4 percentage points on GDP) and investments (+0.2 points), but a decrease in relative employment (-0.2 points), highlighting the need for policies that accompany the transition with greater attention to inclusion and the social dimension of circular work.

In 2024 Italy confirms itself among the EU leader countries in terms of eco-innovation, with performances above the European average in resource efficiency, energy productivity, and emissions. Between 2014 and 2024, the Italian index grew by +39.2 percentage points (pp), exceeding the EU average increase (+27.5 pp), with a particularly marked improvement in resource efficiency (+64.4 pp compared to +62 pp EU).

In 2021, in Italy, consumption and investments caused 439.5 Mt of CO2 (carbon footprint), equivalent to about 1.2% of global CO2 emissions, marking a 15% increase compared to the previous year. Of these, about 52 Mt come from the EU (excluding Italy) through imports, and 126 Mt from the rest of the world. Household activities, primarily from transport and heating, which are solely of Italian origin, account for about a quarter of the carbon footprint. The category of final demand that accounts for the largest share of the carbon footprint is final consumption expenditure (28%). About 12% of Italy's carbon footprint originates from the EU (excluding Italy), 7% from China, 4% from Russia, and 17% from the rest of the world.

An economic system operates through energy inputs. The total energy consumption of resident units indicates the amount of energy used by economic activities and households for production and consumption activities, distinguishing energy uses from non-energy uses.

In 2021, the total energy consumption in Italy amounted to 7.05 exajoules, a 17.1% reduction compared to 2008. The total consumption is almost entirely for energy uses. In 2021, over two-thirds of the total energy use is attributable to productive activities. Among these, the top six activities for energy use (slightly more than half of total use) contribute to nearly 7% of Italy's Gross Domestic Product. 31% of the total energy use is due to household consumption (mainly heating/cooling and transport).

ISPRA also estimates the internal energy footprint, which allows the analysis of energy uses from the perspective of final domestic demand, highlighting the direct and indirect energy amounts embedded in the goods and services offered on the domestic market by Italian production chains.