Until 1987 he held a number of managerial positions in SAE SADELMI, a company owned by General Electric, both in Italy and abroad (the US, Saudi Arabia and Egypt).

[5] Between 1997 and 1998 he was CEO of ABB Combustion Engineering Italy, and then of Alstom Power, where between 1998 and 2000 he was senior vice president of global sales and turnkey plants in the gas turbine division.

During the six years of the Starace management, Enel Green Power established itself as one of the leading global players in the renewable energy sector, with 29 billion kWh generated from 750 plants in 16 countries in Europe, North America and Latin America, and with a mix of well-calibrated green technologies.

[9][10] His strategy puts the focus on the industrial side of the business and he has announced the company's plans for the conversion of 23 thermal power plants of the Gruppo Italia (gas turbine, fuel oil, coal).

[25] From September 2017 to December 2019, the European Commission made him a member of the “Multi-stakeholder Platform on the Implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals in the EU”.

[31] In October 2020 he was appointed Chair of the Administrative Board of SEforALL, an international organization that works closely with the United Nations to accelerate and deliver at scale the solutions needed to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG7) by 2030.