EWI Publishers
- AGCM decision on alleged biofuel cartel incomprehensible and unfounded, based on a complete misrepresentation of the facts and the market – Eni
- The company will defend its case in court
Hear what Eni has said. With regard to the sanction announced today by the Italian Competition Authority (AGCM), following proceedings initiated over two years ago, Eni expresses its strongest disagreement and surprise at the conclusions of the Authority, which considered the company to be involved in an alleged agreement restricting competition among the main oil companies operating in Italy in the motor fuel sector regarding the cost of the bio component factored into fuel prices, added by the companies to traditional fuels to comply with regulatory obligations.
Despite Eni’s full cooperation and transparency in the course of the investigation, the AGCM’s prosecution case is based on a forced reconstruction that ignores market logic and misrepresents the facts, taking legitimate communications related to mutual supply relationships between operators out of context. The AGCM ignores the facts that emerged during the investigation, which show that Eni and the other operators have always acted independently, and often in misalignment. The assessments regarding the publication of prices in the trade press are also unfounded, given that information on changes in the prices of the bio component was already known to the market, and therefore unable to influence competitive dynamics.
The AGCM’s decision appears even more paradoxical when considering that it concerns a component, imposed by regulatory obligations, which accounts for only a few cents per litre of the consumer price of fuel, and unjustifiably affects fair and transparent commercial conduct, discouraging efficiency and innovation in a sector that is strategic for the country.
Unfortunately, this approach, which is not new on the part of the Authority, risks further penalising Italian industrial investments in the energy transition.
In addition to the damage resulting from an unfair fine, which is of a huge amount, today’s measure also constitutes yet another serious damage to Eni’s reputation, as it is being linked to collusive practices to which the company is completely unrelated.
Eni will therefore resolutely defend its case and its reputation in all competent forums, as it did in the past when it received the penalty for alleged unfair commercial practices in relation to its biofuels (Diesel+ case), a penalty that was definitively annulled by the Council of State more than five years after it was imposed.
It would be recalled that Eni had a few days announced unveiling of a new biorefinery project, having received approval from the Italian Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security to convert, according to the Italian energy firm, selected units at the Sannazzaro de’ Burgondi (Pavia) refinery into a biorefinery. EWI (Media) learnt, through an email from the Italian energy firm that the project would involve converting the existing Hydrocracker (HDC2) unit using “Ecofining” technology and constructing a pre-treatment unit for waste and residues which it said are the main biogenic feedstocks used by Enilive in the production of HVO biofuels. Eni also added that the traditional fuel production will still continue, alongside the new production of HVO diesel and SAF-biojet for aviation, expected to begin in 2028. The company also said that the project would be demonstrating a processing capacity of 550,000 tonnes/year of feedstock, with flexibility to produce SAF-biojet and HVO diesel. “The plants will process various biogenic feedstocks, mainly waste and residues.”