• Investments of EUR 5 million to create plants for energy communities
• In 2023, the Swiss group served energy solutions to 47,000 customers in Italy
Source: Il Sole 24 Ore
MET Energia Italia, a company active in the supply of gas and electricity to industrial, commercial and residential customers of the Swiss-based multinational energy company MET Group, which has been present in Italy since 2017, is close to a billion in turnover: in 2023 it posted revenues of EUR 944.8 million. "It is a result lower in absolute terms than that of 2022 - 1.05 billion - which was, however, influenced by rising energy prices," says CEO Giuseppe Rebuzzini.
"At constant values, we recorded a higher performance in 2023. The volumes testify to this: 47,143 customers, more than doubled from almost 20,000 in 2022; 700 million cubic meters of gas sold (+40%); 1TWh of distributed electricity (+110%); over 80,000 supply points."
For 2024, the company plans to establish an Energy Service Company (ESCO) with the aim of promoting sustainable energy solutions at the local level and entering the market of renewable energy communities (CER).
"Within the activities of the new ESCO, we are working to build renewable generation plants between 100 kW and 1 MW in capacity, designed for CERs: our idea is that they will only be able to be effective from suitable production assets. For this reason, around solar installations to be realized on roofs, we want to build communities with local stakeholders. We want to start from the production units and we want to start from at least a share of the 13,000 SMEs we serve within our customer base," explains Rebuzzini, who adds: "To realize plants aimed at CERs, we have a budget of EUR 5 million for the years 2024 and 2025, with the idea of making the project scalable and multiplying the number of communities and investments."
To date, MET Energia Italia has realized around fifty small-scale plants sold to end customers, amounting to a few hundred kW. "Within the Sales Division of our Group, Italy has a central position: it is the country with the greatest market depth and number of customers. Here our retail activity, for residential and SMEs, is stronger and more developed. We want to continue to invest in this market because Italy is a large country in terms of population and industrial presence, with significant energy consumption, and the density of SMEs provides a very interesting context of dynamic realities," continues the CEO of MET Energia Italia.
In addition to investments related to CERs, our country is also present in MET Group's plans regarding industrial-scale renewable energy production plants: "The Group plans to build projects for 500 MW. They are still in the authorization phase. Italy represents today one of the most important markets in Europe both for the presence of favourable conditions, namely sun (especially) and wind, and for a remunerative price structure. However, the problem remains of the slowness of the authorization process which does not help to implement these investments," notes Rebuzzini.
In 2023, MET Group, present in 15 countries, recorded a consolidated turnover of EUR 24.5 billion, down from EUR 41.5 billion in 2022 due to falling energy prices. In the same year, they developed three new solar parks in Spain and Hungary, developing a total generation capacity of 391 MW.