Italian energy giants Eni and Snam have set up an equal joint venture around Italy’s first carbon capture and storage project, Ravenna CCS.

In a joint press release published on 4 September 2024, the two companies announced that Phase 1 of the project is already underway and is capturing CO₂ emissions from Eni’s natural gas treatment plant in Casalborsetti, in the municipality of Ravenna.

The captured CO₂ is being transported to the offshore Porto Corsini Mare Ovest platform through reconverted gas pipelines and then injected and stored at a depth of 3,000 metres in the depleted Porto Corsini Mare Ovest gas field.

A 90% reduction in CO₂ emissions from the plant’s chimney has already been achieved, rising to peaks of 96%. This is noteworthy given carbon concentration levels below 3% and makes Ravenna CCS the world’s first industrial-scale project with such high levels of carbon capture efficiency.

It’s also noteworthy that the Ravenna CCS facility is fully powered by electricity from renewable sources, avoiding further CO₂ emissions.

The project is expected to scale over the coming years and to achieve annual CO₂ storage capacity of up to 4 million tonnes. This is in line with the goals defined by Italy’s Integrated National Energy and Climate Plan (PNIEC).

In terms of the total storage capacity represented by the depleted gas fields on the Adriatic seabed and depending on market demand, the volumes of CO₂ captured and stored underground could reach 16 million tonnes per year. This would make Ravenna CCS a potential hub for the decarbonisation of energy-intensive and hard-to-abate industries and would represent a fundamental contribution to achieving climate goals and carbon neutrality by 2050.