CROTONE – Those solar energy systems that were supposed to guarantee the production of domestic hot water in dozens of hospitals in Calabria were actually built, with a cost of millions of euros, but they never came into operation. Abandoned, now obsolete and dilapidated. For this reason, the Regional Prosecutor’s Office of the Court of Auditors has sued two public managers and three professionals, held responsible for fiscal damage estimated at approximately 1.5 million euros. The five people targeted by the accounting judiciary held, in various capacities, the roles of sole manager of the procedure, director of works or other management tasks in the execution of the contract for the construction of solar thermal systems in 24 hospitals included in the provincial health authorities of Cosenza, Crotone and Vibo Valentia.
The investigations, coordinated by the regional prosecutor’s office of the Court of Auditors and conducted by specialists from the economic-financial police unit of the Catanzaro Finance Police, have ascertained that the plants, built in 2012, never actually came into operation for the benefit of the structures health services, so much so that they are in a state of total abandonment and neglect, in the absence of the planned ordinary and extraordinary maintenance interventions.
According to the complaint, already in the design phase the systems were not correctly sized with respect to the needs of the healthcare facilities nor coordinated with the pre-existing hydraulic systems. Furthermore, some plants were even located in areas with reduced solar radiation. In most cases the works would have been carried out without prior municipal authorizations or concessions and, when necessary, without the authorizations required in the presence of landscape-environmental protection constraints, a circumstance which has led the municipalities, for some plants, to impose specific sanctions and to issue the demolition order for illegally carried out works. Consequently, the five subjects are accused of “seriously negligent” conduct both with reference to the correctness of the projects and to the subsequent checks delegated to the technical figures called upon to protect the public administration in the implementation of the energy improvement program.
The construction of the systems was coordinated by the Provincial Health Authority of Cosenza as leader and contracting authority, also in the interests of the other health authorities, with the technical-administrative collaboration of a specifically established consortium, also with supervisory and coordination tasks. The disputed damage is equal to the contribution that was paid by the Ministry of the Environment for the construction of the plants, as part of a renewable thermal energy program for healthcare companies. Source: Il Crotone
