There is a question that has stayed with me ever since I spoke with Fabrizio Chiara , the founder of SUNSPEKER , in the latest episode of Energ’ Ethic:
“Who wants to see an ugly world?”
He said it almost in passing. But it stayed. Because it is not really about solar panels. It is about the energy transition, and how we have come to speak of it.
Too often, we speak of energy as if it were floating above the ground — detached from the lives, streets, and landscapes it is meant to serve. We obsess over megawatts (585 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity was added worldwide in 2024!), celebrate percentages (in 2024, 46.9% of net electricity generated in the EU came from renewable energy sources!) and return on investment, while ignoring how these installations make people feel. Whether they recognise themselves in the transition. Whether they trust it. Whether they desire it.
And so when a local entrepreneur tells me about his recyclable film that makes solar panels visually disappear — blending into rooftops and facades rather than disrupting them — I do not hear a story about surface innovation. I hear a story about belonging.
Not belonging in the nostalgic sense, but in the profoundly civic sense: recognising that the energy transition must not only happen in our cities — it must fit in with them.
It reminded me of so many recent conversations we have had on Energ’ Ethic Podcast — and beyond.
→ With Rune Kirt, we asked whether energy infrastructure could ever be beautiful — and what beauty even means when designing for trust.
→ With Mirte Jepma, we reflected on belonging — in housing, in energy systems, in the invisible structures that make us feel at home or alienated.
→ With Giulia Ulpiani, we explored the need for coherence between climate ambition and urban identity — how cities are not blank canvases but layered stories.
Rethinking visibility
We speak often of visibility (as we should!) in the energy transition: who gets to decide, who gets heard, who gets represented, what becomes a symbol. But sometimes, the most radical gesture is to allow something to blend in. To respect what is already there. To treat heritage — architectural or emotional — not as a constraint, but as context.
Sunspeker was born in Italy, where constraints abound. Italy’s historic centres are dense, fragile, emotionally loaded. These are places where energy installations, however green, are not always welcome — not because people are “against” the transition, but because they fear losing something irreplaceable in the process. A feeling, a view, a sense of coherence.
Fabrizio’s innovation does not pretend to solve every problem. But it does offer a way forward: a solar solution that aligns with regulation, yes — but more importantly, with sentiment.
Designing for care, not just scale
This speaks to a broader conversation I often return to through my work with the New European Bauhaus: scaling solutions.
But what if the true measure of success is not scale — but care?
At its core, NEB calls for more than a technical transition. It calls for a cultural shift — one that invites beauty, emotion, identity and justice back into the conversation. It is a reminder that sustainability is not just about numbers. It is about care.
Care for how things are made.
Care for who gets to decide.
Care for how places feel.
In this light, Sunspeker is not just a clean tech company. It is part of a wider movement — one that seeks to reconcile industrial production with territorial identity. One that understands that making energy desirable is not an afterthought. It is part of the design brief.
This is not a marginal debate. It is not a “nice to have.”
It is central to Europe’s future.
And this is where my work with the New European Bauhaus meets my work with Energ’Ethic: in this deep belief that sustainability, inclusion, and aesthetics cannot be separated.
They belong together.
Belonging is infrastructure
Too often, infrastructure is treated as something that happens to a place, not with it. But if we want to decarbonise Europe in a way that people support — and even celebrate — then the transition must become part of the scenery. Not an intrusion. Not a disruption. Not an imposition. Something else. Something closer to what Fabrizio proposes: infrastructure that does not dominate, but belong.
It is not easy to design for belonging. It requires slowing down, listening, paying attention to the stories already embedded in a place. It requires shifting the conversation from scale and speed to meaning and coherence.
But perhaps this is precisely what we need more of — in our cities, in our villages, and in the way we imagine our future.
As I said before: Trust is an infrastructure.
A question worth asking
What would change if every energy project started with a question like Fabrizio’s?
“How do we make this belong?”
Not just “how do we make this work?” or “how do we make this cheaper?”
But: how do we make this feel right, here, now, with these people, in this place?
That is not a technical challenge. That is a cultural one.
And perhaps the most urgent one we face.
🎧 Listen or Watch the full conversation:
Making Solar Disappear to Make It Belong — Energ’Ethic Podcast
