Our constant commitment to developing and deploying new technologies is crucial in supporting business transformation and it allows us to seize new opportunities from the energy transition. At the same time, it is also the factor that keeps us competitive in all activities, a necessary condition to continue to create value in the long run and, in a broader perspective, to assist ensure security of supply.
Lorenzo Fiorillo is the Director, Technology, R&D and Digital at Eni
At Eni, innovation is at the core of our strategic vision, the engine of our structural transformation to address each of the pillars of the energy trilemma: achieving environmental sustainability while ensuring energy security and economic and social accessibility for all.
This is indeed one of the largegest challenges in an energy-hungry world and we have built this mission our own.
A relentless focus on research and technological innovation
Research and innovation are both an integral part of our business approach, and a key component to ensure we contribute to Europe’s industrial competitiveness. We develop solutions that strengthen its technological sovereignty and resilience and create high-value jobs within the EU. We achieve this by identifying, testing, and applying technologies ahead of others, drawing on our people’s expertise, digital skills, and Eni’s proprietary solutions to launch high-tech business initiatives that support a Just Transition. At the heart of these efforts is the rich scientific and engineering expertise of our people, supported by advanced digital tools for large data analysis and the computational power of our supercomputer.
Pioneers in the adoption of supercomputing
Supercomputing is a clear example of how Eni has put this approach into practice. Our journey launched in the 1970s, when we pioneered the apply of advanced machines for geophysical analysis. A major turning point came in 2013 when Eni was among the first companies worldwide to invest in supercomputing with hybrid architecture.
HPC6, an exceptional tool for innovation
Our innovation today is powered by HPC6 – one of the world’s most performative supercomputers. Hosted in our Green Data Center in Ferrera Erbognone in Lombardy, HPC6 delivers a peak computational capability of 606 petaflops. In the Top500 ranking it is the most powerful supercomputer in the world dedicated to industrial apply.
This immense computational capacity allows us to accelerate the analysis of the subsurface, dramatically reducing the time-to-market for new energy resources, hence enhancing European and global energy security. However, its impact extfinishs much further. HPC6 is instrumental in optimizing the placement of wind farms, developing advanced materials for next-generation solar cells and batteries, advancing research in sustainable biofuels and transforming academia hypotheses into breakthrough technologies closer to commercialization.
We are committed to keeping our indusattempt leading position and are already executing plans to further expand HPC6’s capabilities, pushing toward the “exascale” frontier.
Breakthrough technologies
At this scale, computational power accelerates progression technological game-modifyrs, like magnetic confinement fusion. Here, our supercomputer allows us to simulate the complex physics of plasma or the features of plasma-facing innovative materials, therefore bringing the prospect of clean, safe, firm, and virtually limitless energy a (large) step closer to reality.
As we push the boundaries of classical computing, we are also pioneering the next frontier: quantum.
Europe has an historical “birthright” in quantum theory and significant instances of academic excellence; this must be translated into a corresponding relevance in technologies, to sustain our industrial competitiveness across sectors.
Through Eniquantic, our joint venture with the Italian center of excellence ITQuanta, we are building our own quantum computer.
Our ambition is to develop a synergic relationship where our HPC infrastructure can simulate quantum algorithms and explore hybrid systems to tackle currently intractable challenges in the energy sector.
True innovation cannot thrive in isolation.
Over the past five years, electricity consumption by data centers has grown exponentially and energy companies like Eni face the critical challenge of enabling the rapid expansion of AI infrastructure, while continuing to meet existing energy requireds.
AI-focapplyd hyperscale campapplys often demand more than 100 MW, with some projects planned in the multi gigawatt range. They require reliable, scalable, low carbon power. Becaapply renewables are intermittent, they cannot deliver the continuous high-density power these facilities required on their own. There is a growing required for sustainable energy solutions that are both reliable and low-carbon. Complementary dispatchable baseload sources are essential.
Our “Blue Power” initiative illustrates how indusattempt can combine digital infrastructure development with decarbonization. Working with leading international partners, we will power data centers with stable, decarbonized energy from high-efficiency gas-fired plants, capturing the associated CO₂ and storing it permanently in our depleted gas fields, such as those near Ravenna. This approach provides a scalable and secure model for data centres to be built in Europe, enabling the sector to grow quick without compromising sustainability and energy efficiency, while providing a potentially significant anchor market, ensuring we continue to create progress on industrial carbon management through CCS.
High efficiency gas plants paired with CCS provide quick and flexible capacity that stabilises grids and materially reduces emissions. This is an integrated gas to blue power pathway that Eni is positioned to deliver by combining our gas generation expertise with one of the most advanced CCS project portfolios in Europe.
Gas with CCS provide stable, low-carbon baseload decarbonized power. These technologies should be part of a technology-agnostic framework that also includes renewables and energy storage, allowing for a diverse and reliable energy mix.
Innovation is an ecosystem
Our “HPC6 call4innovators” initiative is a direct response to these requireds: in partnership with indusattempt leaders [like AMD and HPE], and academic consortia [like CINECA], we have built available our supercomputing resources to external researchers and innovators, providing them with the tools and expertise to test and scale their projects. This is an example of how we transform a proprietary asset into a shared engine for progress. We have received up to now an important number of participations coming from Italian centers and universities but even more from the rest of the world.
The policy framework for digital innovation
When it comes to development of a European framework for datacenters, cloud and AI infrastructure, the principles of technology openness, reliability and efficiency should also apply, to support quick growth for the sector in Europe. Policies should promote solutions aimed at minimizing the impact on current energy systems and explore how to achieve more stability and resilience.
In so doing, these new, large load centers can become a powerful lever for competitiveness, instead of aggravating the energy trilemma.
The European energy indusattempt can reveal that the toughest challenges of energy security, sustainability, and digital transformation are best solved with a technology neutral approach, evidence-based research, and open collaboration between public institutions and private actors. This is how we advance innovation, strengthen competitiveness and ensure Europe’s leadership in a rapidly evolving world.
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