Al Gore points the finger at Italy:«What are all these gas pipelines for?That's the equivalent of 300 coal-fired power plants."

The words of the former vice president of the United States, who is hosting a "training session" of his organization Climate Reality in Rome these days

«Italy is among the European countries working on the largest number of new fossil fuel infrastructures.It's crazy, we are threatening the future of humanity with all these gas pipelines."More than a lesson, Al Gore's speech at the La Nuvola conference center in Rome resembles a real harangue.The former vice president of the United States brought one of the famous ones to Italy for the first time training sessions of his NGO The Climate Reality Project, founded in 2006.Three days of meetings and workshops, from Friday 28 to Sunday 30 June, to discuss not only the devastating effect of climate change, but also (or perhaps above all) the range of solutions available to counter its advance.«Unite your voices, speak truth to power, choose and vote.The future depends on you", says the former right-hand man of Bill Clinton, Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2007, to the over one thousand young people who gathered to listen to his words.

The attack on the fossil lobby

From the stage of La Nuvola, Al Gore points the finger first and foremost at the companiesOil & Gas.The fossil fuel lobby, the Nobel Peace Prize winner attacks, is "the most powerful lobby of all time" and has the power to bend governments' energy policies to its liking.A speech that follows, both in tone and content, many battles carried out by the main environmental associations.With the difference that the speaker in this case is a former vice president of the United States, with the determination of a young activist and the oratory art of someone who has spent a life in politics and eight years in the White House.In his speech-lecture, Al Gore does not even spare a frontal attack on Italian energy policies.«There is already more gas than is needed and new imports of liquefied natural gas continue to be planned.If all the projects being talked about are carried out, it will be like having built more than 300 coal plants", explains Bill Clinton's former deputy.Brief digression and then we return to reeling off the data:«Between 2020 and 2022, Italy gave fifteen times more money to fossil fuels than to renewables», attacks Al Gore again, while the Eni logo looms large on the big screen behind him.And be careful, warns the Nobel Prize winner, not to be fooled by tools such as the capture and storage of CO2.Because fossil fuel companies, Al Gore comments, «are better at capturing politicians than carbon dioxide».

A global network of climate leaders

Since 2006, the year in which The Climate Reality Project was born, the training sessions by Al Gore have become an unmissable event for anyone involved in the climate.The organization founded by the former American vice president can count on 11 branches active in different areas of the world and an international network of approximately 3.5 million people.«We have been organizing for almost twenty years training like this one with the goal of educating people about the science of climate change.Climate denialism still exists, but today it has taken on different forms", explains Phyllis Cuttino, president and CEO of the association founded by Al Gore, backstage on the Roman stage.Climate Reality has four priorities:reduce emissions, finance a "just transition", expose the greenwashing and strengthen international cooperation.«The issues we deal with – adds Cuttino – will gradually become more and more urgent, for the simple reason that more and more people are seeing the consequences of climate change with their own eyes».

The focus on Italy

The session training which is taking place these days in Rome is the 56th since the project was founded, but it is also the first ever to take place in Italy.«The focus of these days is on Southern Europe, which is one of the territories most exposed to the devastating consequences of climate change», explains Paola Fiore, coordinator of Climate Reality for Italy.«I trained at training sessions of Miami in 2015, shortly before the Paris Agreement and the Laudato Si Of Pope Francis» says Fiore.After that experience, he decided to become an active part of the organization, above all contributing to creating a network among those who would like to take action to do their part against climate change, but aren't sure where to start.«Those who inform themselves and are well aware of the climate crisis may feel alone or helpless.These meetings – specifies Fiore – allow us to share, unite, collaborate and above all take action".