New possibility of electric heating promoted by incentives for photovoltaic systems in Italy

Recently in Italy the feed-in tariff for photovoltaic energy systems was approved. This long awaited law, the so called "Conto Energia", has been introduced in Italy for systems between 1 kWp and 1 MWp. The incentives will last for 20 years and for the small systems (up to 20 kWp) they permit the self-consumption of the PV electric energy. Therefore, such consumers face up to an interesting chance that is to fulfil to their heating requirements with electricity driven machines, such as electric heat pumps. Of course, the point of discussion is the entity of the PV incentives related to the rate of natural gas that is the most common fuel used for heating purposes in Italy. Such a new scenario is discussed in terms of an investment analysis.