Angola: President João Lourenço Meets Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi

The President of the Republic of Angola João Gonçalves Lourenço has met with the Chief Executive Officer of Eni Claudio Descalzi in Luanda to review activities in the country and discuss new areas of cooperation.

The Minister of Mineral resources, Oil and Gas Diamantino Azevedo also attended the meeting.

During the meeting Mr Descalzi updated the President on the activities of Azule Energy, the JV between Eni and bp and largest equity producer in the country, with a special focus on the West Hub Integrated development of the Agogo and Ndungu discoveries, and the progress of the New Gas Consortium (NGC), which for the first time in Angola will allow to develop non-associated gas fields, boosting the availability of domestic gas as well as LNG production for export, ensuring the country’s ability to contribute to energy security.

NGC will leverage gas from the Quiluma and Maboqueiro discoveries, as well as other discovered resources in future developments.

Also, the two discussed Azule’s ongoing technical support for Luanda refinery, that includes a study to implement a bio-refinery within the existing Luanda Refinery Complex, leveraging Eni’s own processes and technologies.

Additionally, they analyzed the status of the Caraculo Photovoltaic project in the Namibe region, whose first 25MW plant is already operational since May last year while a second one is under development.

Descalzi also illustrated to the President of Angola the company’s effort in the areas of decarbonization and sustainable energy transition and their positive impact on occupation and economic diversification.

Among other initiatives, the two reviewed Eni’s progress in the production of agri-feedstock for bio-refining: the company has a target of 100 thousand tons of vegetable oil from cultivation on degraded land and cover crops over 150,000 hectares, involving over 100 thousand farmers by 2030.

Furthermore, the CEO and the President reviewed the clean cooking project that was recently launched in Angola, aimed at supporting families in accessing more energy efficient, reliable, and sustainable cooking solutions, mostly produced locally.

The project has already involved 50,000 people and targets to reach more than 2 million people by 2030, reducing emissions associated to cooking activities and preventing health risks.

Finally, Descalzi and President Lourenço reviewed initiatives in the areas of health, where capacity building projects are underway targeting approximately 900 health professionals, and sustainable development projects in the areas of access to water, health promotion, education, social inclusion, economic diversification, access to energy and environment protection benefiting 500,000 Angolans.

Source: https://energynewsafrica.com