Eni and energy infrastructure company Snam entered a joint venture (JV) to develop and manage Italy's first carbon capture and storage (CCS) project, a press release announced on Dec. 19.

"CCS is complementary to renewables, to energy efficiency solutions and to the other available levers, and is central to avoiding CO2 emissions from highly energy-intensive sectors that currently have no technological alternatives for decarbonization," Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi commented in the release.

The JV is looking to contribute to the decarbonization of hard-to-abate sectors such as steel mills, cement, ceramics and chemicals.

"It is a fact that CCS technologies have consolidated their role at a global level as a tool available to achieve decarbonization goals, and for this reason they are gaining more and more attention from governments, investors and industry players," Snam CEO Stefano Venier added.

Phase 1 of the Ravenna CCS project will capture 25,000 tones of CO2 from Eni's Casalborsetti natural gas treatment plant and transported to the Porto Corsini Mare Ovest platform, where it will be injected into a depleted gas field offshore Ravenna.

"Phase 1 of the Ravenna Project will allow to reduce emissions from the Casalborsetti power plant, launching in Italy a project based on a mature technological process that is key for the achievement of our climate goals," Descalzi continued.

The first phase of the project will also create an estimated 500 new jobs, playing an important role in the local economies.

"CCS projects are being developed globally and are already at an advanced stage both in Europe - especially in the U.K., the Netherlands and the Nordic countries and in the U.S.," Venier said. "This joint venture sets the first initiative in Italy with the ambition to offer a solution to the entire hard-to-abate production cluster in the Po Valley and potentially also to other Italian regions as well as other countries bordering the Mediterranean basin."

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