Physical energy flows (Pefa) - Years 2008-2023

On 11th December 2025, Istat updates on its data warehouse (theme ‘National Accounts’, sub-theme ‘Environmental Accounts’, section ‘Physical Energy Flow Accounts – PEFA’) the data for the years 2019-2023 of the Physical Energy Flow Accounts (PEFA) time series (2008-2023) for the Italian economy, expressed in terajoules (tj).

Pefa allows analyzing the interactions between natural system and anthropic system by providing a complete representation (consistent with the system of national economic accounts) of energy flowing from environment to economy, within the economy and from economy to environment.

Compared to the previous edition (April 2025), the years 2019-2023 have been updated for the “Energy intensity of value added” indicator, while for the “CO₂ emission intensity of energy consumption” indicator, the entire 2008-2023 series has been updated, in line with the most recent Air Emissions Account (AEA) data.

The new data confirm that in 2023, the energy flowing into the national economy is approximately 7.7 million terajoules, a reduction of 5.5% on the previous year, revised slightly upwards compared to last April estimate. The energy flowing out of the national economic system, approximately 7.6 million terajoules, is also down on the previous year (-2.8%), with a positive revision of 0.2 percentage points compared to the April 2025 estimate. The net energy accumulation in the economic system, measured by the balance between inflows and outflows, is 0,1 million terajoules.

In 2023, the total energy consumption by production activities and resident households, known as NDEU (Net domestic energy use), is 6.2 million terajoules, 4.8% less than in 2022, with a revision of -0.4 percentage points compared to the April estimate. Of this consumption:

• 32.6% is attributable to households, with the remainder attributable to production activities. Households reduce their consumption by more than production activities (-5.1% compared to -4.6%);
• 2.9% is used for non-energy purposes (NDEU_non energy);
• 19.7% comes from renewable energy sources (-1.5% compared to 2022);
• 82.6% causes air emissions as it is carried out by combustion (-6.8% compared to 2022).

Pefa data are – by construction – comparable with economic data of National Accounts and with other environmental accounts, resulting particularly suitable to using in integrated environmental and economic analysis. In 2023:

• the “Energy intensity of GDP” (ratio of NDEU to GDP) decreases by 5.7% compared to 2022, reaching to 3.2 terajoules per million euros of GDP;
• the “Energy intensity of value added” (ratio of NDEU_energy to value added), calculated with reference to total production activities, stands at 2.3 terajoules per million euros of value added, 4.8% less than the previous year, with significant differences between individual production activities in terms of both in the sign and in the value of the annual change (+1.5% for Agriculture, -10.9% for Industry, and +6.0% for Services);
• the “CO₂ emission intensity of energy consumption” (ratio of CO2 emissions to NDEU_energy) decreased by 2.8% overall compared to 2022, with a more marked reduction for production activities (-3.7%, although there were very different variations for individual activities) than for households (-0.8%).

For more information, please refer to the metadata.

For information

Directorate for national accounts

Giusy Vetrella
tel. +39 06 4673 3236
vetrella@istat.it

Silvia Zannoni
tel. +39 06 4673 3109
zannoni@istat.it