It is no longer just a problem of energy costs. Now companies, especially those that use a lot of gas, have to face another obstacle: there are no longer even suppliers. Eni is buying time, declaring to many entrepreneurs that it is unable to formulate new contracts at this time due to the uncertainty of the international context (obviously referring to the war between Russia and Ukraine), while on the free market the competitors o unsustainable conditions are not found or requested for SMEs. According to Il Sole 24 Ore, Eni itself is taking time as it is waiting for clearer price forecasts.
This is the testimony of the energy-intensive paper companies. For them in these hours the problem is becoming dramatic, because the leaders of 90% of companies in the sector are wondering how to reopen in September. But this scenario is also extending to other energy-intensive sectors and large users of gas from ceramics to the steel industry.
For some companies it is, at this moment, literally impossible to sign a new gas supply agreement for the thermal year 2022-2023, which formally starts on October 1st and will last until September 30th next year. This is the period during which companies usually agree on new contracts. Given the uncertainty, this year some paper companies, to reduce downtime, have anticipated the annual maintenance and in August they have chosen to close without impacting on employment. But at the moment many are wondering how to start again, given that after September there is the risk of not having any supply. Cartiera del Polesine, of Rovigo, with an average turnover of 115 million and over 150 employees, is currently unable to find a contract. Eni has communicated to the top management that it cannot offer availability for now. The other companies asked for a month’s advance payment and a surety of the same value. For the Cartiera del Polesine, the cost of the July bill, adding gas and electricity, came to cost 9 million, four times more than in the same period last year. The fear for them is to run into the default procedure: when a business runs out of gas supplier, the Snam network guarantees energy for 60 days, at increased prices, after which the tap stops, and so does the company. Burgo, one of the leading companies in the paper sector – with 1.8 billion in revenues, 11 factories and 3,125 employees – is in the same situation: Eni does not renew its supply. For them the alternative is Shell or Edison, who have less problems in finding the raw material but who offer high figures and guarantees. Same scenario: one month in advance and sureties. And here at Burgo they remind us that in the meantime gas has already undergone a 30-fold increase in the space of a year and a half.
The luckiest are those who signed contracts between March and April, avoiding the autumn crisis. “Few are those who save themselves from the fear of the energy default procedure – says Lorenzo Poli, president of Assocarta – someone was foresight or just lucky to renegotiate the agreements in the spring. But usually the thermal year ends on September 30th. We hope that the situation will clear up at the end of August ». The general demand is that the government consider introducing a gas price cap. Or that the default procedure be blocked for the whole of 2023. Who will take care of it? Now the next executive. But the issue has so far been absent from election campaigns, despite being strongly felt by businesses. And more and more imminent.
The sector
154 Establishments
In 2021 the paper industry had 119 companies, 154 factories and 19,050 employees, with a production of 9.6 million tons
8.2 billion euros
Last year the sector’s turnover, according to Assocarta data, was 8.2 billion, 4.1 billion of which achieved thanks to exports