The war in Iran is weighing on Italy with an energy bill estimated at almost 12 billion euros, and with direct increases in bills and fuel caused by the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. This is the estimate of the CNA, National Confederation of Crafts and Small and Medium Enterprises: between 1 March and 31 August Italian families and businesses spent 11.8 billion euros more on fuel, electricity and gas compared to pre-crisis levels. About half concerns mobility, with 5.8 billion in petrol and diesel alone, while the electricity bill weighs in at 3.7-3.8 billion and gas consumed directly by families and businesses for another 2-2.2 billion.
It is the account of six months of conflict between the United States, Israel and Iran. Over the same period, globally, fossil fuel importers paid $330 billion more than markets expected before the war, the largest sustained oil shock since the 1990 Gulf War, according to the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air. Italy appears in fifth place among the twenty most affected countries, with a net cost of 10 billion dollars equal to 0.42% of GDP: the equivalent of a day and a half of national income. In front of us only China, India, Japan and France.
Economic consequences of war in Iran: the price of oil reaches our home
Numerous derivatives are extracted from oil, including diesel, which moves trucks, tractors and machinery: when it increases, the increase is transferred along the entire supply chain, from transport to agriculture up to supermarket shelves. It was 57% above expectations in March, it was 65% in August, and in the six months it cost an average of 161 dollars a barrel against the 101 expected before the war. Similar story for gas: the European price went from 44% above expectations in June to 76% in August, and the heating season has yet to begin.
Bills, 276 euros more per family in a year
Energy prices are passed on to families in a cascade. According to estimates from the Facile.it research office, in the next twelve months a family with a tariff indexed in the free market will spend around 276 euros more than what was expected before the outbreak of the conflict. The overall cost of electricity and gas will exceed 2,200 euros, with an increase of 14%.
The weight is almost entirely on gas, which will reach 1,510 euros with a 200 euro increase, while the electricity bill stops at 714 euros with 77 euros more. The reason is that gas is purchased on international markets and is the item most directly exposed to tensions over Hormuz. On the electricity bill, however, the cost of energy is only a part of the total: alongside there are transport, system charges, taxes and VAT, items that do not move with the markets and which cushion the price increase.
A first effect has already arrived. For vulnerable customers still served under Greater Protection, ARERA has established an increase in the electricity bill of 4.6% in the third quarter compared to the previous one.
Petrol and diesel: fuels over 2 euros per litre
On fuels, the summer marked a turning point. From 4 July, with the expiry of the previous intervention on excise duties, prices at the pump started to grow again just as the breakdown of the truce between Iran and the United States brought the Strait of Hormuz back to the center of tensions over crude oil. According to data from the Price Observatory of the Ministry of Business updated to 31 August, the regional average for self-service petrol is 2.023 euros per liter and that of diesel is 2.136. A year ago petrol was around 1.70 euros and diesel at 1.63: it means over 16 euros more for a 50 liter tank with a petrol car and more than 25 euros with a diesel.
The differences between territories are limited but not zero: they range from 2.003 euros per liter for petrol in Lazio to 2.061 in the province of Bolzano, which is also the most expensive for diesel with 2.181 euros compared to 2.113 in the Marche.
Then there is a striking fact, because it goes in the opposite direction to what one would expect. In July, demand for petrol reached 900 thousand tonnes, the highest level in the last sixteen years and 3.1% more than in July 2025, while automotive diesel recorded a decline of 8.4%. In short, Italians have not given up on private cars despite record prices; It was mainly freight transport that cut consumption.
The shopping cart and the autumn rush
Energy does not remain confined to the bill and the distributor: it is transferred to the prices of everything that must be produced and transported. And in an avalanche it is unloaded onto a shopping cart already weighed down by years of price increases. According to a simulation by Sole 24 Ore on a basket of 31 products, the weekly receipt of a couple with a child went from 100 to 129.5 euros between July 2021 and July 2026: an increase of 29.5%, much higher than the general inflation of the same period, which remained at 21%. The peaks concern coffee (+51%), extra virgin olive oil (+47%) and vegetables (+39%).
It is a fact that should be read for what it is: a five-year movement, which began well before the Hormuz crisis. But it explains why even a modest increase in prices today weighs more than it would under normal conditions. It is no coincidence that the share of families who declare they have reduced the quantity or quality of the products purchased rose from 24.3% in 2021 to 31% in 2024, and since then food prices have continued to rise.
For the quarter that opens, Codacons estimates an “autumn rush” of up to 633 euros more per family – the calculation concerns a household with two cars and a school-age child. The heaviest item is energy, with 205 euros more for electricity and gas between September and November if prices remain at current levels. Fuels follow, with a higher quarterly expense estimated at 145 euros for a diesel car and 93 for a petrol one, assuming two tanks per month for each. Then food (around 70 euros, in the hypothesis of price lists growing by 3%), transport (68 euros), going back to school with books and materials (32 euros) and meals away from home (20 euros).
Not everyone agrees: Elettricità Futura, the electricity sector association belonging to Confindustria, defined that scenario as “useless alarmism”, recalling that the majority of families have a fixed price contract and that for those with an indexed tariff the increases would translate into a few cents a day. It is a clarification that matters: the price increases circulated in recent days, including those cited in this article, concern those who have a variable price contract, that is – according to Elettricità Futura – a minority of domestic customers.
In the background remains the question of income. According to the CGIL, since 2021 real wages in Italy have decreased by more than 8%: the high energy costs therefore add to a purchasing power that was already declining before the crisis began.
What ISTAT data say about inflation and prices
In July 2026, consumer prices grew 2.9% year-on-year, down slightly from 3.0% in June. Behind that number, however, there are opposite movements: fuel and fresh food are slowing down, while regulated electricity and gas tariffs are clearly accelerating, going from +9.2% to +14.8%.
Be careful not to confuse the two levels: the slowdown concerns the comparison with a year ago, not the absolute prices, which in the meantime have continued to rise. ISTAT data shows this well: in July the dynamics of fuels fell significantly in the first part of the month and rose rapidly in the second, with diesel going from +21.6% per year in June to +18.8% and petrol from +10.3% to 8%.
The explanation for the times lies in the tariff mechanism. The regulated ones are updated every three months by the public authority, so they arrive in the bill months later than what has already happened on the wholesale markets. It’s why, as the price of oil fell, many families’ bills continued to rise. Within that item, gas in the protected market travels at +22.1% per year and protected electricity at 9.7%.
The variable mortgage instalment: 52 euros more by the end of the year
The third channel is credit. On 11 June the European Central Bank raised the reference rates, then on 23 July it stopped: Christine Lagarde justified the pause with still modest growth in the Eurozone and with tensions in the Middle East, which continue to generate a persistent energy shock on prices.
The effect on installments is already visible. On a standard mortgage of 126,000 euros over 25 years, the installment went from 578 euros in January to 599 in July, and projections indicate around 630 euros by December: 52 euros per month more than at the beginning of the year.
The variable rate today costs less than the fixed rate, but almost no one chooses it: in the second quarter of 2026 the fixed rate was selected in 92% of cases. After three years of unstable instalments, families prefer to pay a little more in order to know in advance how much they will pay.
Why Italian GDP held up (and who paid the bill)
Small businesses are absorbing the hardest impact. As CNA notes, they have fewer tools than larger companies to protect themselves from fluctuations in energy markets, a lower contractual capacity in purchases and more difficulty in transferring cost increases to final prices. For the association it is an extraordinary energy tax on the Italian economy, with the risk that a geopolitical crisis turns into a brake on competitiveness and investments.
What did not come true, however, was the announced disaster regarding growth. In the second quarter, Italian GDP grew by 0.2% compared to the previous three months and by 1.0% on an annual basis, bringing the growth already achieved for 2026 to 0.8%, and the Parliamentary Budget Office in August revised its estimate for the year upwards to +0.9%.
The reason is that the impact has been absorbed on other fronts. On the one hand, growth came from services, while industry and agriculture – the sectors most exposed to the cost of energy – recorded a decline, and the picture was mainly supported by investments linked to the PNRR. On the other hand, public interventions prevented the increases from being fully passed on to final prices: in the March-August six months alone, over 2.3 billion euros were mobilized between excise duty reductions, tax credits and other measures.
In short, the Italian economy has held up better than feared in March, but the cost has not disappeared: it has shifted. It has been absorbed by families, who pay more on their bills and at the pump and put aside less, and by the State, with aid that covers only part of the higher costs. It’s a partial hedge, and with winter still ahead the bill for the next few months will depend on how long the crisis in the Strait of Hormuz lasts.
