EIB, Eni sign 500-million-euro loan agreement for new biorefinery in Sannazzaro de’ Burgondi, Italy

From left, Vigliotti and Descalzi. (Photo: Eni)

The European Investment Bank and Eni signed a 15-year loan April 1 for 500-million euros (USD$580 million) to convert selected units of Eni’s Sannazzaro de’ Burgondi refinery, located in the Italian province of Pavia, into a biorefinery.  

The agreement was signed by EIB Vice President Gelsomina Vigliotti and Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi. 

The project involves converting the refinery’s hydrocracker (HDC2) unit using Ecofining™ technology, and building a pretreatment plant for waste materials like used cooking oils and animal fats, as well as waste from the agrifood industry, which comprise the main feedstock used by Enilive to produce hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) biofuels. 

With its proprietary Ecofining™ technology, Enilive produces HVO, which can be used in approved engines, and is already available at more than 1,600 Enilive service stations across Europe.  

From 2028, the Sannazzaro plant will start producing HVO diesel biofuels and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), with a production capacity of around 550,000 metric tons per year. 

Building on existing utilities and infrastructure, the project will complement conventional fuel production with HVO and SAF, helping reduce the carbon footprint of transport and decarbonize the aviation sector, for which SAF is currently the only available solution.  

By diversifying the product offering on the market, the project will also strengthen Italian and EU energy security and serve the objectives of REPowerEU by expanding Europe’s biofuel production capacity. 

The project follows a 500-million-euro financing agreement signed in July 2025 to convert Eni’s Livorno refinery into a biorefinery.  

Transforming part of the Sannazzaro de’ Burgondi refinery also pursues Enilive’s strategic objective: increasing biofuel production capacity to 5 million tons by 2030, including over 2 million tons of SAF production capacity.  

Biofuels are currently produced at Enilive’s biorefineries in Venice and Gela, and at the St. Bernard Renewables biorefinery in Louisiana, a joint venture in which Enilive holds a 50 percent stake.  

These will be joined in 2026 by Italy’s third biorefinery in Livorno, followed by two biorefineries currently under construction in Malaysia and South Korea.  

A fourth biorefinery in Italy, in Priolo, Sicily, will be developed together with Q8 by 2028. 

“This financing represents strategic support for a project with high environmental and industrial value, contributing to the decarbonization of the transport sector, particularly aviation,” EIB’s Vigliotti said. “Through this initiative, the EIB aims to strengthen Europe’s capacity to produce advanced fuels and to promote the circular and sustainable use of resources.”  

Eni’s Descalzi added, “This new agreement with the EIB demonstrates the effectiveness and robustness of the strategy we pursue through our businesses related to the energy transition. To deliver a tangible transition towards energy solutions that have an increasingly low environmental impact, it is essential to create businesses that can grow and generate value. We achieve this by combining technology and the ability to deliver industrial-scale projects on the one hand, with a broad and growing customer base on the other. We see biorefining and biofuels as a fundamental component to support the progressive decarbonization of transport—applicable across all segments of the sector, and already well aligned with existing demand. We are the second-largest producer of biofuels in Europe and are working on three refinery conversions in Italy. This follows the completion of two others in Venice and Gela, which are already making a major contribution towards a more environmentally sustainable supply for the transport sector.” 

Demand for SAF, driven by the blending mandates of the ReFuelEU aviation regulation, is expected to grow rapidly from 2030 onwards—underpinning the technical and economic robustness of the initiative and its long-term sustainability.  

HVO biofuels play a key role, as they can deliver an immediate contribution to emissions reduction along value chains for the entire transport sector, including aviation, road, maritime and rail transport. 

The conversion of the Sannazzaro site is consistent with the strategy of Eni and Enilive to increase biofuel production in response to growing demand in Europe and Italy, both to meet the emissions-reduction targets set out in the Renewable Energy Directive (RED III), and to comply with Italian regulations on placing pure biofuels on the market.  

In 2024, biofuels accounted for 4 percent of worldwide energy consumption in transport and are expected to reach 9 percent by 2035 and 12 percent by 2050, based on the International Energy Agency’s net-zero scenario of the World Energy Outlook 2025.