Felice Ippolito (16 November 1915 – 24 April 1997) was an Italian geologist, politician and engineer. He was a fiery promoter of the development of nuclear energy in Italy. His daughter is the actress

Angelica Ippolito Angelica Ippolito (born 8 September 1944) is an Italian stage, film and television actress. Life and career Born in Naples to geologist Felice Ippolito and writer and playwright Isabella Quarantotti. Her mother married thirdly to actor and pla ...

Biography

Born in

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

, Ippolito graduated in

civil engineering Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including public works such as roads, bridges, canals, dams, airports, sewa ...

with a specialization in geology in 1938, and in 1950 he became Professor of Applied Geology at the

University of Naples Federico II The University of Naples Federico II ( it, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II) is a public university in Naples, Italy. Founded in 1224, it is the oldest public non-sectarian university in the world, and is now organized into 26 depar ...

.Giuseppe Sircana. "IPPOLITO, Felice".
Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani - Volume 62
'.

Treccani The ''Enciclopedia Italiana di Scienze, Lettere e Arti'' ( Italian for "Italian Encyclopedia of Science, Letters, and Arts"), best known as ''Treccani'' for its developer Giovanni Treccani or ''Enciclopedia Italiana'', is an Italian-language ...

, 2004. Interested in the use of civil nuclear energy because of his researches on

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

as a geologist, in 1952 he became General Secretary for the use of nuclear energy, became in 1960 the (CNEN), the predecessor of ENEA. In this role, he contributes to various projects including establishing the

Latina Latina or Latinas most often refers to: * Latinas, a demographic group in the United States * Latino (demonym), a term used in the United States for people with cultural ties to Latin America. *Latin Americans Latina and Latinas may also refer ...

Trino Trino ( pms, Trin) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Vercelli in the Italian region Piedmont, located about northeast of Turin and about southwest of Vercelli, at the foot of the Montferrat hills. Trino borders the following mun ...

and

Garigliano The Garigliano () is a river in central Italy. It forms at the confluence of the rivers Gari (also known as the Rapido) and Liri. Garigliano is actually a deformation of "Gari-Lirano" (which in Italian means something like "Gari from the Liri") ...

nuclear power plants. In December 1955, he was among the founders of the

Italian Radical Party The Italian Radical Party ( it, Partito Radicale Italiano), also known as the Historical Radical Party (''Partito Radicale storico''), was a radical, republican, secularist and social-liberal political party in Italy. History Since 1877, t ...

. In August 1963 an Ippolito case about a supposed maladministration of the CNEN broke in the newspapers. Ippolito was arrested in 1964 and sentenced to 11 years in prison. The case was widely considered as a scapegoat to block nuclear power in favor of the nascent Italian oil industry, and it has also been associated to the mysterious death of

Enrico Mattei Enrico Mattei (; 29 April 1906 – 27 October 1962) was an Italian public administrator. After World War II he was given the task of dismantling the Italian petroleum agency Agip, a state enterprise established by the Fascist regime. ...

in 1962. Ippolito was pardoned by Giuseppe Saragat after two years in prison. In 1968, Ippolito founded the magazine ''

Le Scienze ''Le Scienze'' (''The Sciences'') is an Italian monthly science magazine, It is the Italian edition of'' Scientific American''. History and profile Published monthly since 1968, ''Le Scienze'' was founded by industrial Alberto Mondadori and scie ...

'', the Italian version of ''

Scientific American ''Scientific American'', informally abbreviated ''SciAm'' or sometimes ''SA'', is an American popular science magazine. Many famous scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it. In print since 1845, it ...

''. Between 1979 and 1989, he was an Independent Left (''Sinistra indipendente''; SI) MEP, elected on the

Italian Communist Party The Italian Communist Party ( it, Partito Comunista Italiano, PCI) was a communist political party in Italy. The PCI was founded as ''Communist Party of Italy'' on 21 January 1921 in Livorno by seceding from the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) ...

list.

References

External links

Felice Ippolito MEP Page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ippolito, Felice 1915 births 1997 deaths Engineers from Naples 20th-century Italian geologists MEPs for Italy 1979–1984 MEPs for Italy 1984–1989 Italian Communist Party politicians Radical Party (Italy) politicians University of Naples Federico II alumni Academic staff of the University of Naples Federico II Politicians from Naples