JUDGMENT NO. 88

YEAR 2026

ITALIAN REPUBLIC

IN THE NAME OF THE ITALIAN PEOPLE

THE CONSTITUTIONAL COURT

composed of:

President: Giovanni AMOROSO;

Judges: Luca ANTONINI, Stefano PETITTI, Angelo BUSCEMA, Emanuela NAVARRETTA, Maria Rosaria SAN GIORGIO, Filippo PATRONI GRIFFI, Marco D’ALBERTI, Giovanni PITRUZZELLA, Antonella SCIARRONE ALIBRANDI, Massimo LUCIANI, Maria Alessandra SANDULLI, Roberto Nicola CASSINELLI, Francesco Saverio MARINI,

has pronounced the following

JUDGMENT

in the proceedings for conflicts on the allocation of powers between public bodies arising from the decrees of the Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security - Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments, adopting environmental impact assessments (EIA) dated February 14, 2025 (protocol no. 68), March 13, 2025 (protocols no. 125 and no. 128), April 2, 2025 (protocol no. 177), April 11, 2025 (protocol no. 192), April 14, 2025 (protocol no. 203), and any other preliminary, consequential, or related act, initiated by appeals filed on April 14, 2025, and June 5, 2025, by the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, served on April 14, 2025, and June 4, 2025, respectively, lodged with the Registry on April 14, 2025, and June 5, 2025, registered under numbers 3 and 4 of the 2025 register of conflicts between branches of government, and published in the Official Gazette of the Republic, special first series, numbers 19 and 25 of 2025.

Having examined the appearances of the President of the Council of Ministers, as well as the intervention filed by EF Agri società agricola a rl;

having heard Judge Rapporteur Angelo Buscema at the public hearing on March 24, 2026;

having heard counsel Andrea Sticchi Damiani for EF Agri società agricola a rl, Mattia Pani for the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, and State Attorney Giorgio Santini for the President of the Council of Ministers;

having deliberated in the chambers on March 24, 2026.

Legal Reasoning (Facts)

1.– By appeals served on April 14, 2025, and June 4, 2025, lodged on April 14, 2025, and June 5, 2025, and registered under nos. 3 and 4 of the 2025 register of conflicts between branches of government, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia initiated conflicts of attribution against the President of the Council of Ministers and the Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security (MASE) - Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments, seeking the annulment of the decrees adopting environmental impact assessments (EIA) dated February 14, 2025 (protocol no. 68); March 13, 2025 (protocols no. 125 and no. 128); April 2, 2025 (protocol no. 177); April 11, 2025 (protocol no. 192); April 14, 2025 (protocol no. 203) and any other preliminary, consequential, or related act.

To that end, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia requests that it be established in both appeals: a) that the State, and through it, its administrative bodies, specifically the Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security - Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments, lacks the power to disapply current regional laws – in particular, Law of the Sardinia Region no. 20 of December 5, 2024, titled «Urgent measures for the identification of suitable and unsuitable areas and surfaces for the installation and promotion of renewable energy source (RES) plants and for the simplification of authorization procedures» – as it is not permissible for any public administration, including the State, to review the constitutionality of such laws for the purpose of disapplying them via administrative measures; or, in the alternative, b) that the Autonomous Region of Sardinia holds, pursuant to Article 3, letter f) of Constitutional Law no. 3 of February 26, 1948 (Special Statute for Sardinia) and Article 6 of Decree of the President of the Republic no. 480 of May 22, 1975 (New implementation rules for the special statute of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia), exclusive legislative power in matters of urban planning and construction (as well as agriculture and forestry, pursuant to Article 3, letter d, of the same statute), together with the related landscape and environmental protection profiles, with the consequent possibility of impacting, in the exercise of said legislative power, the matter of «production and distribution of electric energy» (a matter in which the Region possesses legislative power pursuant to Article 4, letter e, of the Special Statute), also under the combined provisions of Article 117, third paragraph, of the Constitution and Article 10 of Constitutional Law no. 3 of October 18, 2001 (Amendments to Title V of Part II of the Constitution), when the regulation of the cited matter interferes with areas of exclusive regional legislative competence. Further in the alternative, c) that the Autonomous Region of Sardinia holds: i) the authority to regulate the scope of application of areas defined as suitable pursuant to Article 20, paragraphs 4 and 8, of Legislative Decree no. 199 of November 8, 2021, titled «Implementation of Directive (EU) 2018/2001 of the European Parliament and of the Council of December 11, 2018, on the promotion of the use of energy from renewable sources» and, therefore, ii) the power to identify suitable and unsuitable areas and surfaces for the installation and promotion of RES plants and for the simplification of authorization procedures.

1.1.– The Autonomous Region of Sardinia complains of the impairment of its legislative, constitutional, and statutory powers resulting from the environmental impact assessment measures adopted by the MASE Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments pursuant to Article 23 of Legislative Decree no. 152 of April 3, 2006 (Environmental Regulations), regarding three projects for the construction of agrivoltaic plants located in the Province of Oristano (EIA decrees protocol nos. 68, 125, and 128 of 2025) and three projects for the construction of agrivoltaic plants located in the Province of Sassari (EIA decrees protocol nos. 177, 192, and 203 of 2025).

According to the appellant, by declaring the environmental compatibility of the plants through these measures, the MASE a priori excluded the application of Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, by which the Region intended to identify areas suitable and unsuitable for the installation of RES plants: a law adopted in the exercise of primary legislative power in matters of urban planning, construction, agriculture, and forestry (Article 3, letters d and f, of the Special Statute), and in matters of landscape protection and planning, pursuant to Article 6 of Presidential Decree no. 480 of 1975, as well as concurrent legislative competence in the matter of «production and distribution of electric energy» (Article 4, letter e, of the Special Statute), resulting in a violation of the legislative powers statutorily assigned to the Region.

More precisely, regional counsel argues that the Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments, in responding to specific requests for environmental compatibility opinions on said projects, issued decrees granting positive environmental compatibility judgments without verifying whether or not the projects fell within an area identified as suitable or unsuitable under the cited Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, thereby fundamentally excluding the application of the aforementioned regional legislation.

The challenged disapplication was purportedly justified by an unspecified order of the Council of State, which stayed as a precautionary measure Article 7, paragraph 2, letter c) of the decree of the same MASE, adopted in concert with the Ministers of Culture and of Agriculture, Food Sovereignty and Forestry on June 21, 2024 (Regulation for the identification of suitable surfaces and areas for the installation of renewable energy plants), in the portion that granted regions the power to restrict the scope of application of areas defined as suitable pursuant to Article 20, paragraph 8, of the cited Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021, «by establishing that the Regions were required to ensure compliance with suitable areas already identified by national laws without discretion, pending a decision on the merits not yet reached»: this would imply the illegitimacy of any regional-level provision that, in identifying suitable areas, restricts the minimum of suitable areas identified by the State legislature with the last-cited provision.

The appellant therefore observes that this has resulted in a violation of its constitutional prerogatives and powers.

1.2.– The aforementioned Directorate-General not only decided not to implement a current regional law, but more fundamentally asserted the illegitimacy of any regional provision producing the aforementioned effect.

In doing so, the MASE – and, for it, the Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments – purportedly exercised powers it does not possess, as the State administration usurped the right – reserved exclusively by the Constitution to this Court – to ascertain the potential constitutional illegitimacy of a regional law, in violation of Articles 127, 134, and 136 of the Constitution.

In this regard, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia notes that, with Judgment no. 26 of 2022, this Court has already upheld a previous conflict of attribution brought by the appellant, in which the disapplication of an existing Sardinian law by State bodies was contested. The appellant further recalls that, following the amendments to Article 127 of the Constitution made by Article 8 of Constitutional Law no. 3 of 2001, the Constitution provides for a model of challenging regional laws based on their subsequent review, such that their effectiveness and, therefore, their application is not excluded even where they are contested by the State, as long as this Court has not declared their constitutional illegitimacy. Only the constitutional body expressly designated for this purpose by a specific constitutional grant may, in fact, ascertain the constitutional illegitimacy of a law and order its eventual declaration, which, in theory, entails the cessation of effectiveness (Article 136 of the Constitution) from the day following the publication of the decision (Article 30, paragraph 3, of Law no. 87 of March 11, 1953, «Rules on the constitution and functioning of the Constitutional Court»).

In recalling the relevant legal framework and the principles established by constitutional jurisprudence within the scope of conflicts of attribution between the State and the regions, the appellant focuses on the impairment of the exercise of regional legislative powers in the present cases, as well as the existence of a legal interest in the appeal, in consideration of the prejudicial nature of the contested act regarding the legislative powers fixed by Articles 3 and 4 of the Special Statute, in relation to Presidential Decree no. 480 of 1975, articulating a specific argument.

2.– The President of the Council of Ministers, represented and defended by the State Attorney-General, entered an appearance in both proceedings, requesting that the conflicts be declared inadmissible and, in the alternative, unfounded.

2.1.– The appeals are argued to be inadmissible for lack of "constitutional tone." The State Attorney-General maintains that what is relevant for the constitutional tone of a conflict is that the appellant must not complain of just any injury, but rather an injury to its constitutional powers (citing the judgments of this Court no. 28 of 2018, no. 87 of 2015, and no. 52 of 2013). To provide constitutional tone to a conflict, it is essential to demonstrate the effective exercise of a power, lacking a legal basis, "that concretely impacts the constitutional prerogatives of the appellant" (citing the judgments of this Court no. 259 of 2019, no. 260, and no. 104 of 2016).

In this instance, however, the State defense argues that the adoption of the EIA measures did not concretely impact constitutionally guaranteed regional powers. The Region, it is argued, alleged a defect of administrative legitimacy, specifically the illegitimacy of the MASE environmental assessment measures; such illegitimacy could be asserted in the competent judicial fora and not via a conflict of attribution before this Court. Furthermore, the Sardinia Region has already challenged the measures in question before the Regional Administrative Court for Sardinia, complaining specifically of the violation of Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024.

From another perspective, the appeal is argued to be inadmissible in any case, as the conflict resolves into a mere complaint of an incorrect interpretation by the MASE of the applicable discipline in the specific case, as well as an allegedly erroneous interpretation regarding the consequences deriving from the order of the Council of State, Fourth Section, of November 14, 2024 (no. 4298), which purportedly led to the re-expansion of the effectiveness of Article 20, paragraph 8, of Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021 (citing the judgments of this Court no. 263 of 2014, no. 52 of 2013, no. 90 of 2011, no. 235 of 2008, and no. 380 of 2007).

2.2.– The appeal would, in any event, be unfounded, because the EIA decrees adopted by the MASE did not in any way compromise the exercise of the legislative functions constitutionally attributed to the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, as no "usurpation" conflict or "impairment" (or interference) conflict occurred.

Following a reconstruction of the national and European regulations on the development and dissemination of renewable energy plants, the State Attorney-General observes that the MASE, contrary to what is asserted by the appellant Region, did not disapply Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, given that the EIA decrees constitute an expression of the exercise of an administrative function proper to the State administration within the scope of the competencies fixed by Article 25 of Legislative Decree no. 152 of 2006, which thus represents the legal basis for the attribution of the power exercised in the case under examination.

Moreover, the regulation on environmental impact assessment should be attributed, primarily, to the matter of environmental protection, which falls under exclusive State competence, as it concerns "procedures that concretely and preventively evaluate 'environmental sustainability'" (Judgment no. 225 of 2009). Regions are required, on one hand, in the exercise of their competencies, to respect the homogeneous levels of environmental protection set by the State, being able only – potentially and indirectly – to determine an elevation of those same levels; on the other hand, they must keep their legislation within the areas of competence fixed by the Environmental Code (citing the judgments of this Court no. 16 of 2024, no. 227 of 2011, and no. 186 of 2010).

In summary, the Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments of the MASE, with the EIA measures challenged by the appellant, exercised the ordinary power belonging to the administration, limiting itself to providing an interpretation of the Interministerial Decree of June 21, 2024, in light of the cited Council of State order no. 4298 of 2024, which suspended, as a precautionary measure, Article 7, paragraph 2, letter c) of the cited interministerial decree – according to which regions, in identifying suitable areas for the installation of RES plants, have "the possibility to safeguard the suitable areas referred to in Article 20, paragraph 8" of Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021 – deeming the suspended provision "not fully compliant" with the aforementioned State provision, which already lists the areas considered suitable without apparently leaving space for more restrictive regional regulation. For these reasons, the Ministry was required to apply what was ordered by Article 20, paragraph 8, of Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021 and not the subsequent provisions on area suitability adopted by the Region with Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024.

Furthermore, the State Attorney-General highlights that the Sardinia Regional Administrative Court, First Section, with precautionary order of May 15, 2025 (no. 96), adopted within the scope of one of the administrative proceedings initiated by the Autonomous Region of Sardinia against the EIA measures adopted by the MASE, recognized the absence of an injury to the constitutional and statutory prerogatives of the appellant, specifying that "the challenged measure is a decree of environmental compatibility of the project, but the Region remains the holder of the authorization power ex Article 12 of Legislative Decree no. 387 of 2003, such that, in that forum, it may potentially apply Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, if deemed applicable."

In conclusion, therefore, according to the State Attorney-General, the EIA decrees adopted by the Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments of the MASE neither impaired nor injured the sphere of powers constitutionally attributed to the Region (neither in terms of disapplying Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, nor in terms of a priori excluding the applicability of such regulation), given that the administrative function was carried out within the scope of the competencies established by law in environmental matters, taking into account the overall reconstructed legal framework.

3.– By act filed on May 20, 2025, the agricultural company EF Agri a rl intervened in the proceedings related to the appeal registered under no. 3 of the 2025 register of conflicts, asserting its standing, having filed the ministerial EIA application in relation to the three agrivoltaic plant projects to be realized in the Province of Oristano, to which the MASE measures that the appellant requested to be annulled refer: thus, the intervener holds a subjective legal position susceptible to being prejudiced by the outcome of the conflict (citing this Court’s Judgment no. 230 of 2017).

3.1.– The company raises several grounds for the inadmissibility of the appeal.

3.1.1.– First, the appeal is argued to be inadmissible for lack of interest, since the projects could be realized and placed into operation only following a regional procedure aimed at the issuance of the single authorization referred to in Article 12 of Legislative Decree no. 387 of December 29, 2003 (Implementation of Directive 2001/77/EC on the promotion of electricity produced from renewable energy sources in the internal electricity market). In that forum, therefore, the Region – which has circumscribed its interest in bringing the action to the desire to enforce its own regional regulation – could apply Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024. Therefore, the feared prejudice (realization of a plant in an area where a prohibition is in force) would be purely potential and not actual, as well as dependent on a decision that the appellant Region itself must adopt. Nor is there any injury to constitutional powers, since the Region could exercise its own authorizing power for the purposes of the realization and operation of the plants.

The company also maintains that for projects subject to State EIA, the competent authority is the MASE, whereas for projects concerning the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) – such as the one under examination – Article 8, paragraph 2-bis, of Legislative Decree no. 152 of 2006 established an ad hoc Commission (PNRR-PNIEC Technical Commission) tasked with investigative examination in view of their strategic nature. Therefore, the Region based the conflict on a provision inapplicable in ministerial EIA proceedings.

The appeal represents, on the other hand, an example of a premature request for protection, involving powers not yet exercised by the Region, which limited itself to arguing in the appeal that the plants would be located in an unsuitable area under Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024; however, such an argument would not serve to establish an interest in the appeal, being instead necessary to have a prior exercise of administrative power in the forum designated for that purpose, i.e., the decision on the application for the issuance of the single authorization.

3.1.2.– The appeal would also be inadmissible because the Region did not challenge the legislative act on the basis of which the MASE adopted the EIA measures, with the consequent untimeliness of the conflict of attribution promoted herein, which would rather have the purpose of circumventing the expiry of the deadline for challenging. The challenged EIA measures, in fact, make strict application of the minimum of suitable areas provided for by Article 20, paragraph 8, of Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021 (never challenged by the appellant Region).

More precisely, the intervening company observes that, as recently recalled also by this Court with Judgment no. 28 of 2025, Article 20, paragraph 8, of Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021 introduced the minimum level of suitable areas which cannot be derogated in peius by the Regions. The Region, therefore, should have timely challenged Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021, complaining of the constitutional illegitimacy of the minimum of suitable areas.

The appellant was, in fact, well aware that the MASE could have done nothing other than apply the essential minimum level of sites identified by the State legislature. It follows that the appeal for conflict of attribution brought against the EIA measures would be untimely because it evades the expiry of the deadline for the appeal against Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021.

3.1.3.– The appeal would be inadmissible, further, for lack of constitutional tone of the conflict.

According to the intervening company, the MASE did not declare that it did not wish to apply the regional regulation, having, on the contrary, applied the State regulation in light of the correct recognition of the regulatory framework, as resulting from the cited order of the Fourth Section of the Council of State no. 4298 of 2024.

On this point, constant constitutional jurisprudence is recalled, according to which regions may bring an appeal for conflict of attribution, pursuant to Article 39, first paragraph, of Law no. 87 of 1953, when they complain not of just any injury, but the prejudice to one of their own constitutional competencies. If this does not occur and, however, the illegitimate use of a State power is proposed that determines consequences felt as negative by the regions, but not such as to alter the constitutional distribution of competencies or, in any case, if proof and adequate motivation of such alteration are not given, the conflict cannot be considered admissible (citing, among others, this Court’s Judgment no. 108 of 2021).

In the case at hand, there is, according to the company, no alteration of the distribution of competencies, since the Region could well apply its own regulation in the context of the issuance of the single authorization, a power that would be of exclusive regional belonging and that would not be in the least bit affected by the challenged EIA measures.

3.2.– In the alternative, the appeal is argued to be unfounded, because the regional regulation is not applicable to State EIA procedures. The MASE, therefore, correctly "disapplied" the regional regulation, as it was "clearly in conflict with the reference Euro-unitary discipline, implemented in Italy by Legislative Decree no. 199/2021."

The intervening company maintains that it would be the duty of judges to disapply domestic regulation in conflict with European Union law and, since Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024 is in conflict with the principle of maximum dissemination of RES plants, enshrined in multiple sources of European Union law, such regional regulation should be disapplied.

3.3.– The company asserts, finally, that Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024 is constitutionally illegitimate for multiple reasons and asks this Court to raise before itself the relative questions of constitutional legitimacy.

4.– The President of the Council of Ministers filed briefs in due time, insisting on the inadmissibility or, in the alternative, the groundlessness of the appeals with arguments analogous to those set forth in the act of appearance.

5.– The Autonomous Region of Sardinia also filed briefs in which it insists on the upholding of the appeals.

Preliminarily, the Region points out that its interest in appealing remains even after the subsequent declaration of constitutional illegitimacy, by this Court’s Judgment no. 184 of 2025, of some parts of Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, given that, on one hand, in no passage of the cited judgment is a total lack of regional legislative power in the matter of identifying suitable and unsuitable areas stated, and, on the other hand, a total disapplication of the same regional law by the MASE would still persist, even with regard to the provisions not challenged or not censured by this Court.

The appellant also notes that Article 20 of Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021 was repealed by Article 2, paragraph 1, letter q), of Decree-Law no. 175 of November 21, 2025 (Urgent measures regarding the 5.0 Transition Plan and energy production from renewable sources), converted, with amendments, into Law no. 4 of January 15, 2026: a decree-law that introduced a new discipline on the identification of suitable areas.

This being said, the Region deems groundless the exception raised by the State Attorney’s Office of inadmissibility of the conflict for lack of constitutional tone, noting how, on the contrary, the circumstance that, within some environmental impact assessment proceedings, under ministerial competence, the MASE engaged in conduct contrary to the legislative powers attributed to the Region by the special statute, certainly legitimizes the initiation of a conflict of attribution. In substance, the MASE, by substituting itself for this Court, effectively impaired in total the exercise of regional legislative power in the matters of urban planning, construction, landscape protection (and agriculture and forestry), as well as the production and distribution of electric energy, deciding not to apply, even before the referenced Judgment no. 184 of 2025, Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024 and, even asserting the illegitimacy of every regional norm that impacts in a restrictive sense on the minimum of suitable areas identified by the State legislature.

The regional defense also recalls the doctrine according to which the constitutional conflict is configured not when any type of defect in the content of an act is denounced, but only when the defect of the act, in and of itself and independently of the content, constitutes an injury to the constitutional position of the appellant. In theory, from the content of the act, no concrete and negative effect might result for those who suffer it. The conflict is justified, in any case, in that the act that gives reason for it expresses the claim to establish an undue relationship of subjection or, in any case, of conditioning between powers.

The Autonomous Region of Sardinia also asserts – on the basis of a specific university study already filed during the principal constitutional legitimacy proceeding related to the appeal registered under no. 8 of the 2025 register of appeals (decided with the referenced Judgment of this Court no. 184 of 2025) – that the Island would already be capable not only of fully reaching the energy thresholds from RES plants fixed by European parameters, but even of exceeding them even in the previous full application of Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, before its partial constitutional illegitimacy was declared.

As for, finally, the questions of constitutional legitimacy proposed by the intervener, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia believes they are by now "lacking in currency and lacking in interest" in the face of Judgment no. 184 of 2025 which intervened in the meantime. In any case, the questions would be inadmissible, given that they are not decisive for the purposes of the decision of these appeals.

6.– The agricultural company EF Agri a rl filed a brief with which it insists on the declaration of inadmissibility or groundlessness of the appeal registered under no. 3 of the 2025 register of conflicts.

Legal Reasoning (Decision)

7.– With the appeals indicated in the header (registered under no. 3 and no. 4 of the 2025 register of conflicts), the Autonomous Region of Sardinia promoted conflicts of attribution against the President of the Council of Ministers and the MASE in order to obtain the annulment of the EIAs in relation to three projects for the realization of agrivoltaic plants located in the Province of Oristano (EIA decrees protocol nos. 68, 125, and 128 of 2025) and as many projects located in the Province of Sassari (EIA decrees protocol nos. 177, 192, and 203 of 2025), as well as any other preliminary, consequential, and connected act.

The Sardinia Region asks this Court to ascertain that it is not for the State and, through it, its administrative bodies, specifically the MASE - Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments, to disapply current regional laws (including Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024), as it is not permissible for any public administration, including the State, to review their constitutional legitimacy for the purpose of their disapplication via administrative measures.

7.1.– The appeals concern analogous and strictly connected measures and also propose identical censures, such that the proceedings are to be joined to be decided with a single judgment.

8.– In the acts of appearance in court, the State Attorney-General excepts the inadmissibility of the appeals for lack of prejudicial capacity of the challenged acts. The State defense also excepts the absence of constitutional tone of the conflicts, as the Region would denounce a mere violation of law and not an injury to constitutional prerogatives.

Such exceptions are not well-founded.

8.1.– Regarding the alleged lack of prejudicial capacity, it is to be recalled that the intersubjective conflict may have as its object both an act and a conduct – "provided they are endowed with effectiveness and external relevance – which are aimed at expressing, in a clear and unequivocal way, the claim to exercise a particular competence, injurious to the sphere of constitutional attribution of the appellant" (Judgment no. 163 of 2025).

In the case at hand, the MASE EIA decrees express in a clear way the claim not to take into account Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, as it is considered illegitimate. The aforementioned decrees appear, therefore, capable of injuring regional legislative power.

8.2.– Regarding the constitutional tone, this Court, deciding on an analogous conflict, concerning the disapplication of a Sardinian law, affirmed "that what the appellant proposes is the negation of its constitutional prerogative as an entity holding the power to adopt laws, which, even if potentially illegitimate, necessarily produce their effects as long as they are not declared as such" (Judgment no. 26 of 2022). Also in the present proceeding, therefore, the constitutional tone exists.

Groundless also is the further point that deduces the inadmissibility of the appeal by reason of its interpretative character, in that it would be limited to denouncing the erroneous interpretation of the consequences deriving from the order of the Council of State cited in the premises of the EIA decrees.

In reality, in two points of each appeal, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia asserts that, even if the illegitimacy of the regional law were to follow from the order of the Council of State, the disapplication of such law by the Ministry would, in any case, be affected by a lack of power. The conflict, consequently, does not take on an interpretative character.

8.3.– In the illustrative brief filed in the proceeding related to the appeal registered under no. 3 of the 2025 register of conflicts, the State defense maintains that, given that this Court’s Judgment no. 184 of 2025, which declared the partial constitutional illegitimacy of Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, intervened in the meantime, the cessation of the subject matter of the dispute should be declared. Following that pronouncement, in fact, the injury denounced with the appeal would no longer be concrete and actual.

Also this exception is not well-founded.

Regardless of the fate suffered by the disapplied regional provisions, in fact, the injurious claim manifested with the challenged decrees of the MASE remains intact.

As for the prerequisites for the cessation of the conflict, this Court has constantly affirmed that, for the interest in the appeal to be declared as having ceased, it is necessary that the injurious act be declared null, thus with ex tunc effectiveness. Recently, moreover, it was excluded that the examination of the merits was impeded by the occurred annulment (by the Lazio Regional Administrative Court) of the State acts challenged with the conflict (Judgment no. 163 of 2025).

In the case at hand, the interest has not ceased, since the decrees with which the MASE pretended to exercise a power of review and disapplication of the regional law are still effective.

Likewise, it is not relevant that the regional law allegedly disapplied has failed in some of its parts (ex tunc, with the cited Judgment no. 184 of 2025), both because this supervenience has not eliminated the regional law itself in total, and because the object of the conflict is the ascertainment of competence in the abstract, from the lack of which the invalidity and annulment in the concrete of the injurious acts follow.

9.– In the act of intervention inherent to the appeal registered under no. 3 of the 2025 register of conflicts, declared admissible with an order read at the hearing on March 24, 2026, and attached to the foot of this judgment, the agricultural company EF Agri a rl contests the defect of interest of the Region, as it could assert its own competence downstream of the EIA decree, that is, in the venue of single authorization.

The exception is not well-founded.

Differently from what is maintained by the intervening company – namely that the appeal would aim to inhibit the realization of the RES plant in an unsuitable area – the appeal for conflict of attribution was promoted to defend regional legislative power against the ministerial claim to review and disapply a regional law. Consequently, even the potential possibility for the Region to impede the realization of the plant does not exclude its interest in obtaining a pronouncement on the arrangement of constitutional powers.

9.1.– According to the company, furthermore, the appeal would be inadmissible for lack of interest, because the regional law at the origin of the conflict would be inapplicable in ministerial EIA proceedings.

Also this exception is not well-founded.

The Region, in fact, contests the ministerial claim to review and disapply a regional law. Therefore, even if, in hypothesis, the MASE had erred in considering itself conditioned by the regional law, there would remain, in any case, the injurious exercise of the claim unchanged and, therefore, the utility of a pronouncement of this Court.

9.2.– For the same reason, the exception according to which only at the moment of the investigation, to be carried out following the application for single authorization, the competent public administration could evaluate whether the plant project effectively falls into an unsuitable area is not well-founded. The profiles related to the application of the law in the concrete case do not interfere with the object of the conflict, which pertains to the relationship between State administrative power and regional legislative power.

9.3.– Still, according to the company, the appeal would be inadmissible for failure to challenge, by the Region, of the underlying legislative act (Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021), on the basis of which the MASE adopted the EIA decrees.

Also this exception is not well-founded.

As said, the main object of the conflict does not pertain to the delimitation of suitable areas, but to the ministerial power to review and disapply a regional law. Under this aspect, the EIA decree is not merely executive of a previous State law, which, in any case, does not justify the failure to apply a current regional law.

9.4.– Finally, the agricultural company EF Agri a rl excepts the defect of constitutional tone and the interpretative character of the conflict. Regarding these profiles, the same considerations made in relation to the analogous exceptions of the State Attorney’s Office in point 8.2 apply.

10.– The main ground of censure is that related to the alleged violation of Articles 127, 134, and 136 of the Constitution, from the combined provisions of which the appellant deduces the absence of any power of the judge and of the administration to disapply a regional law.

The censure is well-founded.

This Court, with the referenced Judgment no. 26 of 2022, dealt with an analogous case, concerning an intersubjective conflict arisen following the disapplication of a Sardinian regional law by a State administration. At that time, it was a matter of the choice of the Superintendencies for archaeology, fine arts, and landscape for the Metropolitan City of Cagliari and the Provinces of Oristano and South Sardinia, as well as Sassari and Nuoro – called to express their opinion on interventions to be realized in landscape-protected zones – not to apply Sardinia Regional Law no. 1 of January 18, 2021 (Provisions for the reuse, redevelopment, and recovery of existing building heritage and regarding territory government. Urgent extraordinary measures and amendments to regional laws no. 8 of 2015, no. 23 of 1985, no. 24 of 2016, and no. 16 of 2017), challenged in the meantime by the Government. The Autonomous Region of Sardinia, then, complained of the injury to its constitutional powers, in violation, among others, of Articles 127, 134, and 136 of the Constitution. In that case, this Court upheld the appeal, since from the tenor of the challenged acts emerged the "precise intent of the administration [to] deny effectiveness to a regional legislative act."

10.1.– For the purposes of resolving the present conflict, therefore, this Court is called to verify whether the conduct put into place by the MASE, materialized in the adoption of the challenged decrees, is effectively qualifyable in terms of disapplication of Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024 and, if affirmative, whether the MASE is legitimized to operate such disapplication, which was motivated also in light of the order of the Fourth Section of the Council of State no. 4298 of 2024, which suspended, as a precautionary measure, Article 7, paragraph 2, letter c) of the Interministerial Decree of June 21, 2024, in the part where it seems to leave to the regions the power to restrict the set of areas defined as suitable by State legislation.

To answer the first question, reference must be made to the content of the measures in contestation and, in particular, to what has already been signaled in the venue of evaluation of the constitutional tone of the conflict for the purposes of its admissibility.

From the overall tenor of the decrees, it emerges with sufficient clarity that the MASE recognizes the validity of Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024 and, nonetheless, disapplies it, deeming it constitutionally illegitimate.

This is deduced in particular from two motivational passages, identical in all six challenged decrees. In the first, it "[takes] note that the Autonomous Region of Sardinia issued Regional Law no. 20 of December 5, 2024, titled 'Urgent measures for the identification of suitable and unsuitable areas and surfaces for the installation and promotion of renewable energy source (RES) plants and for the simplification of authorization procedures,' with which it identified the areas and surfaces suitable and unsuitable for the installation of plants from renewable energy sources." With the second, it places as the basis of the measures the consideration that from the statements contained in the cited order of the Council of State "follows the illegitimacy of any regulatory provision of regional rank that, in identifying suitable areas, finds space to impact, in a restrictive sense, on the minimum of suitable areas identified by the State legislature in paragraph 8 of Article 20 of Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021."

The positive judgment of the MASE on the environmental impact assessments, therefore, not only was rendered without considering whether the area on which the projects insisted fell or not among those identified as suitable by Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, but is founded on the disapplication of the aforementioned regional regulation.

It cannot be shared, therefore, the assumption of the respondent, according to which the MASE expressed itself positively by reason of the prevalence of State regulatory sources. Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024 expressly provided, in fact, the applicability in the regional territory of its own provisions to all EIA proceedings of both State and regional competence (Article 1, paragraph 2).

The MASE, in application of the principles on the succession of laws in time, which impose on public administrations to apply the regulation in force by reason of the chronological criterion, should not have disapplied Sardinia Regional Law no. 20 of 2024, issued subsequently to Legislative Decree no. 199 of 2021. Moreover, the referenced regional law was declared only in part constitutionally illegitimate by this Court, without affecting regional legislative competence in the theme of identifying areas suitable and unsuitable for the installation of RES plants (Judgment no. 184 of 2025).

10.2.– Clarified that one is in the presence of a failure to apply, by the State administrative authority, of a regional law, based on the alleged illegitimacy of the latter, it follows that the contested acts violate the constitutional norms evoked by the appellant and, precisely, Articles 127, 134, and 136 of the Constitution.

As already affirmed by this Court in the frequently cited Judgment no. 26 of 2022, "[s]uch provisions outline – after the amendments to Article 127 of the Constitution made by Constitutional Law no. 3 of 2001 – a model of challenging regional laws based on their subsequent review, such that they do not exclude their effectiveness, and therefore their application, even where they are contested and as long as this Court has not declared their constitutional illegitimacy. Only this last declaration entails the cessation of effectiveness (Article 136 of the Constitution) of the challenged norm, which consequently will not be able to have application from the day following the publication of the decision (Article 30, third paragraph, of Law [no. 87 of 1953])."

For the reasons mentioned above, the appeal must be upheld in reference to the parameters indicated above, as it was not for the MASE to disapply the regional regulation. Consequently, the challenged measures must be annulled.

The upholding of the appeal in reference to Articles 127, 134, and 136 of the Constitution entails the absorption of the censures proposed in reference to Articles 116 and 117, third paragraph, of the Constitution, the latter in combined provision with Article 10 of Constitutional Law no. 3 of 2001, as well as to Articles 3, letters d) and f), and 4, letter e), of the Special Statute, and 6 of Presidential Decree no. 480 of 1975.

FOR THESE REASONS

THE CONSTITUTIONAL COURT

having joined the proceedings,

1) declares that it was not for the State and, for it, the Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security - Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments, to adopt the environmental impact assessments with the decrees of February 14, 2025 (protocol no. 68); of March 13, 2025 (protocols no. 125 and no. 128) and annuls, as a result, the same decrees;

2) declares that it was not for the State and, for it, the Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security - Directorate-General for Environmental Assessments, to adopt the environmental impact assessments with the decrees of April 2, 2025 (protocol no. 177); of April 11, 2025 (protocol no. 192); of April 14, 2025 (protocol no. 203), and annuls, as a result, the aforementioned decrees.

Thus decided in Rome, at the seat of the Constitutional Court, Palazzo della Consulta, on March 24, 2026.

Signed:

Giovanni AMOROSO, President

Angelo BUSCEMA, Editor

Valeria EMMA, Chancellor

Filed in the Registry on May 25, 2026

The Chancellor

Signed: Valeria EMMA

 

Attachment:

Order read at the hearing of March 24, 2026