For the Cartiera del Polesine di Rovigo company – 115 million in turnover and 170 employees – the bill has quadrupled. Between electricity and gas in July there was a very high bill: 9 million in total, compared to 2,350 million in the same period last year. A negative record, which weighs heavily on the choices of top management, struggling with the decision on how to reopen in September. In fact, a production line was already stopped in July, leaving the other three active for the production of corrugated paper for packaging (therefore the gas and electricity bills are not even related to full capacity). In August, production was stopped, bringing forward the maintenance period. Now weighs the unknown of the reopening, even if the managers are trying to safeguard the employees anyway.
The head of the company’s energy sector, Alfredo Pregnolato, underlines how “the tax credit has helped businesses, but only minimally reduced bills. In the case of Cartiera del Polesine – he explains – at the end of July the bill would have been 400% higher, with the tax credit going up by 370% ».
In general, bills increased exponentially throughout the year: in the first half of 2021 they weighed 11.5 million; in the same period of 2022 costs rose to 44.5 million.