The DIGITA project aims to explore how digital technologies and innovations in home energy can improve the resilience of Italian households to environmental risks in a world moving towards a zero-emissions economy, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic. The risks considered include climate change and air pollution.

To this end, DIGITA will analyse not only the availability of these technologies, but also their potential. The approach will be a comprehensive assessment of the entire innovation ecosystem, going beyond a simple technical examination. The project will highlight the key role of different actors, such as institutions and policies, in facilitating the adoption of digital technologies to increase the resilience of Italian households to environmental challenges.

A combination of frontier research approaches will identify the key levers and barriers for the diffusion of smart home energy technologies in Italy to increase household resilience in Italy.

Specific attention will be devoted to the role of inequality of opportunities to adapt; the extent to which the rapidly changing institutional setting due to digitalization and COVID-19 pandemic is widening the adaptation divide; and identifying policy solutions to overcome this tension.

High-frequency energy consumption data and a large scale randomized controlled trial in conjunction with a major energy utility will provide novel empirical evidence on the micro-behavior of households and their resilience strategies.

DIGITA will achieve its goal by relying on original and detailed data sources and combining a wide range of advanced research methodologies.

DIGITA will use existing surveys and carry out a novel one; combine them with geospatial climate and pollution data and smart meter electricity usage; make use of detailed databases on patent statistics; carry out structured expert elicitations and large scale field experiments.

The results emerging from DIGITA will contribute to the design of novel policy interventions to increase Italian households' resilience through the use of digital home energy technologies in the context of the transition towards a net-zero economy and society.