Adnkronos (Adnkronos) – The new Comasina primary substation, built by Unareti, an A2a Group company, as part of the plan to develop and upgrade Milan's electricity grid, has entered service. The infrastructure increases the system's efficiency and supports the city's progressive electrification of consumption and ongoing urban transformations, from the spread of electric mobility and heat pumps to the growth of renewable energy generation.
Milan boasts one of the highest electricity demand densities per square kilometer in Europe, and its demand is set to grow with the ongoing electrification and digitalization processes. This is why our strategy focuses on increasingly efficient, flexible, and intelligent networks, capable of supporting the city's development: the Comasina primary substation is proof of this.
Over the past five years, we have allocated approximately €800 million to renovating and expanding our distribution infrastructure, innovating the urban network and strengthening its capacity to handle growing loads. This is yet another step, and not the last, in A2a's commitment to Milan," said Renato Mazzoncini, CEO of A2a.
"The inauguration of the new primary substation in the Comasina neighborhood is a further step towards strengthening the local electricity grid and a testament to A2A's concrete commitment to the city," emphasized Elena Grandi, Milan's Environment Councilor.
"This strategic infrastructure," he continues, "will improve service quality, while also reducing the risk of grid overloads and improving efficiency and sustainability. Furthermore, a new primary substation could simplify the configuration of a new solidarity-based energy community in the future, further contributing to Milan's energy transition." Due to their complexity and size, primary substations are strategic nodes in the electricity grid: they receive high-voltage energy and convert it to medium-voltage, feeding it into urban centers and optimizing the management of the local electricity system. With an investment of over €38 million, the Comasina facility will streamline the distribution of loads currently supported by other substations, supporting their operations and ensuring service quality and continuity. The new setup brings the infrastructure closer to users and improves distribution across the lines, reducing network losses. The additional counter-feeding points will also reduce the incidence of faults and speed up service restoration. The overall project also includes the redevelopment of 71 kilometers of medium-voltage network and the strengthening of 27 secondary substations, with benefits for nearly 100 users in the northwest area of the city.
With the entry into service of Comasina, Unareti has built four primary substations since 2022 (Rozzano, San Cristoforo, Mugello, and Comasina). The Scalo di Porta Romana substations will be added by the end of the year, bringing the total to 16, a 45% increase compared to 2020. Over the past five years, approximately 530 new secondary substations have been built and over 200 have been renovated. More than 400 km of underground cables have been replaced, identifying the sections requiring priority intervention using algorithms, and an additional 250 km of network has been built to connect new users. The digitalization of the infrastructure, with the installation of advanced remote control systems, has extended real-time monitoring and improved reporting management, reducing the time needed to identify anomalies and restore service. The Comasina primary substation was created by transforming a former Unareti electrical substation into a modern infrastructure, thus eliminating the need for additional land. It was built to provide continuity of service in an area characterized by the presence of numerous underground utilities, employing some of the most advanced technologies currently available on the market, enabling greater automation of the medium-voltage grid. Given the progressive electrification of consumption and the challenges of climate change, Unareti's 2035 Strategic Plan for the city of Milan envisions an additional €2 billion in investments.
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