In his recent letter titled «Brother Sun», Pope Francis announced his intention to fully convert the Vatican to green energy as part of his efforts to combat climate change.
The Catholic Church first began publicly addressing the issue of climate change with Pope Paul VI, who in 1971 expressed concern that «humanity risked destroying nature by exploiting it». Under the leadership of Benedict XVI more than two decades ago, the Vatican began talking about plans to become the first «carbon-neutral» state with the construction of the Vatican Forest in Hungary in 2007 (although the plans never materialized). Eventually, in 2008, 2,400 solar panels were installed on the roofs of the Vatican’s Paul V Hall, confirming the efforts of its predecessors.
In 2015, the current Pope Francis published a letter on «Care for our common home», in which he spoke about the detrimental effects of climate change. In 2016, the Vatican upgraded its recycling system, and in 2023 — has adopted electric vehicles in partnership with Volkswagen.
The next step, according to a new statement by Pope Francis, will be the construction of a solar power plant that will provide electricity to the entire Vatican City with a population of approximately 825 people. The station will be located about 17 kilometers from Rome, in the Santa Maria di Galeria area — the area currently owned by Vatican Radio, which has often been the subject of controversy over electromagnetic waves.
Source: Euronews, Interesting Engineering
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