The principles of circularity underpin Eni’s commitment, along with environmental protection. Through the implementation of a circular model, business processes are overhauled, minimising the withdrawal of natural resources and favouring the use of sustainable inputs, reducing and exploiting waste through recovery or recycling, and extending the service life of products and assets through reuse or reconversion. We also invest in research and technological innovation and benefit from local partnerships
Eni’s circular economy model also includes 3 levers that constitute tools to support the application of circularity principles.
Reduce consumption of virgin and exhaustible inputs in favour of renewable and alternative sources, including secondary raw materials.
Design innovative and integrated solutions to improve process and product efficiency for resource optimisation along the life cycle and recyclability of manufactured products.
CO₂ emissions are understood as a material flow that needs to be reduced, reused, recycled, removed and offset in terms of the residual part present in the atmosphere.
Meet people’s needs by reducing the production of new goods, maximising their lifespan and promoting their more effective and efficient use.
Enhance assets, land and products by interpreting them in a new way and giving them a new life.
Maximise the efficient use of resources (such as water and land), minimise waste and exploit it as a new, sustainable input, promoting its regenerative capacity.
We analyse innovative processes and products in the circular economy throughout the entire life cycle, from design to disposal, using analysis tools such as Life Cycle Assessment (LCA).
We rethink the classic business model from a circular perspective, leveraging research both internally, using Eni’s expertise and proprietary technologies, and externally, including by identifying new solutions through Open Innovation actions to support the business and production ecosystem.
Work in synergy and industrial symbiosis with stakeholders in order to optimise the use of resources and energy and share experiences and best practices, boosting the culture of the circular economy.
A new development paradigm is essential to take us from the linear growth model to a circular model that makes it possible to reduce and transform waste, giving a second life to existing material.
Claudio Descalzi
Eni Chief Executive Officer
Versalis has adopted two projects to create virtuous circles aimed at recovering and recycling its polyethylene industrial packaging and then feeding it back into the system for reuse.
We also achieve our decarbonization goals with the biomethane supply made possible since 2022, with the establishment of EniBioch4in, a company created following the acquisition of FRI-EL Biogas.
They are central to the evolution of our company and make an important contribution to the process of decarbonization of all products and processes by 2050.
Hoop® is the Versalis project for the development of a new chemical recycling technology to give a second life to plastic waste.
Ponticelle is a brownfield site outside the Ravenna plant. The project for its revival combines inclusiveness and sustainability, in full synergy with the principles of the circular economy.
Eni and Ecopneus have signed an agreement to study and assess technologies suitable for recycling ELTs to obtain sustainable chemical and energy products.
Balance® is the new family of Versalis intermediates and polymers made from alternative raw materials with ISCC PLUS certification.
NFocusing on circularity, Eni applies a vertically integrated approach to bio-refining. For example, in the Republic of Congo, Kenya, Angola, Mozambique, Rwanda, Côte d’Ivoire and Algeria, Eni is structuring an agri-hub network to supply its bio-refineries and achieve a production target of 200,000 tonnes of vegetable oil by 2026, promoting local development. Furthermore, Eni works with farmers to recover marginal land that is not suitable for food purposes in order to cultivate plants for energy use. The consolidation of this model, which has important employment implications for the region, favours the energy transition of the countries involved, integrating them into the biofuel value chain.
We have about 90 active agreements and partnerships with private entities, public administrations and various kinds of organisations. Our transformative approach and circularity platform are the basis for strengthening a change that is already based on long-term relationships with local stakeholders, on attention to the specific features of local areas, and on listening to and including stakeholders in the promotion of new cultural models.
In the field of biomethane, we collaborate with Consorzio Italiano Biogas, Coldiretti and Confagricoltura to establish cross-cutting supply chains between the agriculture and energy worlds. For used cooking oil (UCO), an alternative to vegetable oils processed in bio-refineries, we cooperate with the CONOE, RenOils and Utilitalia consortia. For end-of-life tyres (ELTs), we work with Ecopneus. Circular economy solutions are the protocols with the city of San Donato Milanese and Metropolitana, Taranto, Kyma, and the Campania region. From experimentation with waste-to-energy projects to sustainable mobility, digitisation of the urban fabric, and promotion of the use of low-impact asphalt.
Collaborations in the area of plastics and rubber recycling include agreements with Forever Plast, Ecoplastic and Corepla, as well as an agreement with AGR for the development of elastomer-based products from post-consumer rubber. Another significant partnership is with Servizi di Ricerche e Sviluppo (S.R.S.), which owns a pyrolysis technology for the chemical recycling of plastics. In the areas where it operates, Versalis is committed to developing projects aimed at engaging and raising awareness among citizens with regard to the circular economy and sustainability. In particular, targeted communication and dissemination activities make it possible to appeal for action from local areas and to spread the culture of the circular economy, enhancing the actions of individual citizens to achieve common goals.
Eni Rewind is engaged in reclamation and redevelopment activities to breathe new life into brownfield and former industrial areas so that they can host new development initiatives, acting as a driver of sustainable growth in local areas. This circular commitment is also achieved through management and exploitation of groundwater and waste.
An initiative adopted by Versalis and Eni to recover and recycle polystyrene cups from vending machines. The recycled material feeds the Versalis Revive® EPS production plant.
In schools we promote sustainable resource management through recovery of used cooking oil, the circular economy, bio-sustainable agriculture and marine pollution.
This document identifies a set of guiding principles and is the result of a consumer journey initiated by Eni in cooperation with the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa and the 19 trade associations recognised by the Ministry of Economic Development.
For Eni, measuring circularity is an essential tool for the control, management, transparency and credibility of the goals and commitments made to its stakeholders in the transition towards a circular economy model. In this regard, the Eni HSEQ (Health, Safety, Environment, & Quality) department, with the support of the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa, has developed a Circularity Measurement Model, validated by Certiquality, a third-party certification body, based on internationally recognised principles.
The model has been applied to different company areas including operational sites, processes and business units, allowing, through the monitoring of specific indicators including HSE indicators, the detection of both the current circularity levels and the effect of the identified improvement opportunities.
The model also provides for following the guidance of national and international standardisation bodies engaged in drafting standards to measure circularity. Eni is a member of the UNI/CT 057 “Circular Economy” Commission, a mirror of ISO/TC 323 “Circular Economy”.
Joule is Eni’s business school, set up in 2020 with the aim of fostering the development of innovative and sustainable startups through training courses aimed at the new generation of entrepreneurs and an accelerator dedicated to decarbonization, the fight against climate change and the circular economy.
In 2021, Joule developed a model for assessing business ideas that meet circularity criteria in collaboration with the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa, and in particular with its spin-off Ergo, which is consistent with Eni’s circularity measurement model.
The sustainability report contains goals, strategies, projects, and results for a fair and inclusive energy transition. Browse the interactive feature and download the full document.
IWe invest in initiatives that promote access to efficient and sustainable energy, including through the development of new technologies.