The Inverted Geometry of Capital
In the heart of the Western Alps, where the air should be clearer thanks to the sustainable mobility promoted by the Cuneo Bike Festival, an invisible but materially dense conflict is taking place. The sixth edition of the event, held between September 25th and 27th, 2026, transformed Piazza Galimberti into a hub for over three thousand children and cyclists, celebrating urban regeneration and the conscious use of public space. However, this narrative of ecological rebirth clashes with an opposite infrastructural reality: according to the Ecomafia 2026 report by Legambiente, the province of Cuneo recorded in 2025 an anomalous peak of illegality related to construction materials and waste disposal. This figure is not marginal: 140 specific crimes were reported for illegal waste trafficking and 77 for the abusive cycle of cement and quarries.
This combination of figures—217 illicit activities concentrated in two physical supply chains—places Cuneo at the top in Piedmont, surpassing Turin not only in absolute volume but also in density of crime per capita compared to the industrial size of the region. The tension emerges here: while the municipal administration promotes projects such as the redevelopment of Corso Giovanni XXIII to intercept 1.8 million euros from the Regenerative Cities program, a parallel system for managing material flows operates outside the rules of the formal market. Illegal capital not only destroys the environment; it replaces public infrastructure in regulating waste disposal and supply costs.
The Material Constraint: Cement, Quarries, and Invisible Flows
To understand the severity of the situation, it is necessary to analyze the physical substrate. Cement is not an abstract commodity; it is a high-energy density material, whose life cycle — from extraction in quarries to transport by road to illegal dumping in landfills — generates high profit margins precisely where controls are most difficult to map. The 77 crimes in the cement and quarry sector do not represent simple administrative violations, but indicate a structured organization that exploits the geographical complexity of the Cuneese area to evade fiscal and environmental traces.
The cement supply chain in Piedmont is historically rooted in the hilly and mountainous areas of the province. Illegality lies in the discrepancy between the volumes legally extracted and those moved within the territory. When a construction company uses untracked material or disposes of construction site debris without the necessary permits, it is effectively circumventing the environmental costs internalized by the legal market. This creates an unfair competitive advantage for formal companies that comply with regulations, distorting the local reconstruction and construction market.
“The province of Cuneo is first in Piedmont for crimes in the cement and waste trafficking sector… These are traditional criminal organizations, companies or branches of businesses that, in an organized manner, commit crimes that damage both the environment and, consequently, the surrounding community.” — La Stampa
The underlying mechanism is clear: the scarcity of authorized disposal sites and the high costs of legal transport create a demand for solutions that fuels the black market for waste.
Photo by Jakub Żerdzicki on Unsplash
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