Eni and Veritas are working together to promote the circular economy by transforming Venice’s waste materials into energy resources

A technical roundtable will design the industrial plants that Eni intends to build in Porto Marghera to produce biomethane, bio oil and hydrogen from garbage and from recycling.

Venice, 8 October 2018 – Eni and Veritas, a multiutility that collects, recycles and treats waste in the 51 Municipalities of the metropolitan area of ​​Venice, signed an agreement today to promote the circular economy by reusing waste and transforming it into energy.

As part of the agreement, a technical roundtable will be established to ascertain how industrial projects could transform waste from urban collection into energy. Eni intends to build plants in the biorefinery area in Porto Marghera. The working group, composed of qualified technicians, will design the industrial plants to produce biomethane, bio oil and hydrogen. In particular, their work will focus on the design of a treatment plant for residues of plastic materials, aiming to produce hydrogen, and a treatment plant for organic materials to produce biomethane. Plans to construct plants to supply biomethane to Veritas to fuel the company’s vehicles are also underway. The agreement also foresees that the multi-utility vehicles will soon be powered by Eni Diesel+ fuel, produced at the Eni biorefinery in Venice using an ever-increasing share of exhausted vegetable oils, and tested since April by all the city’s public transport watercraft.

“Venice, the foremost Italian metropolitan area in recycling, is proving today that it has all the right credentials to be a virtuous example of cooperation for the development of the circular economy: nothing is thrown away and recycling produces wealth. What today is a cost and a problem, tomorrow becomes an advantage” - stated Luigi Brugnaro, Mayor of the City and of the Metropolitan City of Venice. “In the Porto Marghera area, on one hand, we are at the forefront in identifying new technological and industrial actions to transform waste into energy resources, and on the other have confirmed our vocation of actively contributing to environmental sustainability, encouraging the reuse of materials, preventing waste from being dispersed and therefore becoming potentially dangerous to humans, animals and the environment. Thanks to Eni and Veritas for reaching this important agreement: “Venice can but support you and side with you”.

«This agreement represents a further important step in our strategy of applying the principles of the circular economy to our business model» commented Giuseppe Ricci, Eni's Chief Refining & Marketing Officer. "The Circular economy means less consumption of raw materials, less environmental impact, and more recovery and recycling of waste material. We have the technologies to obtain energy products from urban collection materials, but in order to recover an even larger share of these wasted raw materials, society needs to undergo a cultural evolution. In Italy today, less than 25% of recycling potential is collected, meaning 75% of waste oils go into the environment: recycling, instead, would lead to quadrupling the availability of raw materials for Eni Biorefineries, to increasing the production of biofuels and to significantly reducing environmental impact».