Just over fifteen days after the Italian G7, where the key importance of the Mattei Plan and the need for a greater commitment to Africa’s development were reaffirmed, the President of the North Tyrrhenian Port Network Authority, Luciano Guerrieri, has gone to Brussels to sign an important Memorandum Of Understanding with the port of Damietta.
The aim is to consolidate the role of the ports of Livorno and Piombino as privileged options for trade in the Euro-Mediterranean region.
The strategy put forward by Mr. Guerrieri had already been anticipated a month ago at the last meeting at the Port Network Authority’s headquarters, in Palazzo Rosciano, to discuss the Red Sea crisis and the impact it was having on national trade dynamics.
“The tension in the Middle East is just the latest dramatic episode in a series of events that reiterates the need to balance resilience and efficiency in a context in which geopolitical and geo-economic interests are increasingly intertwined,” President Guerrieri said at the time, pointing out that recent dynamics confirmed the unfolding of new scenarios facilitated by the emerging reshoring and nearshoring processes: “Production is returning to countries of origin and short-range geographical areas, highlighting the central role of Turkey, Morocco and Egypt. We have to liaise with these countries in order to intercept the new market needs.”
At that discussion meeting, Livorno Port’s leading figure made no secret of his desire to immediately begin to set up a network of contacts and relations with these countries, classifying the port of Damietta as a springboard for defining new ways of collaborating with the Maghreb countries.
From that moment on, Livorno Port Network Authority and the Port Authority of Damietta have been working flat out to define the content of the new agreement, fine-tuning its details and evaluating the opportunity of setting up a meeting for signing it in Brussels on 27thand 28th June, just when the European Council is meeting to vote and formalize the choice of the three names for the President of the EU Commission, the President of the EU Council and the EU High Representative.
It is no coincidence that the agreement is to be signed in the capital of European politics and, in particular, at Tuscany Regional Administration’s offices at 14 Rond Point Schuman. The intention is to render this agreement much more effective and to give it a much greater geographical impact than if it had been signed in Damietta or Livorno. Moreover, it is no accident that the Port Network Authority’s priorities have been agreed upon step-by-step with the Ministry of Infrastructure and the Regional Administration itself, considered by the Authority as an essential institutional reference point for coordinating and implementing initiatives designed to create new synergies at a macro-local area level.
“Our Port Network Authority is moving in the direction outlined by the current government and its Mattei Plan,” said Mr. Guerrieri, on the sidelines of the signing ceremony. “In the context of significant regionalization of commercial traffic, the port of Damietta can become a strategic partner for building new industrial chains in the energy context.”
The agreement, which has an annual validity, envisages closer cooperation between the two Port Authorities on issues the EU considers of key importance, such as digital transformation, enhancing multimodal transport, and sustainable development in ports. The North Tyrrhenian Port Network Authority considers sustainable development to be a particularly strategic concern and has already defined its own strategy to promote energy transition some time ago.
Decarbonization is through the sea. That’s a fact. Hydrogen can play an important role in achieving carbon neutrality.
It is certainly no coincidence that the agreement between the two Port Authorities has been signed in the middle of a conference on the opportunities of developing hydrogen at EU level, an international initiative that was attended by, among others, the Director of the Logistics & Maritime Sector of the Egyptian Ministry of Transport, Sherif Zakaria; the President of the Arab Academy of Science Technology Maritime Transport, Ismail Abdel Ghafar; and the Director General for Energy in Europe (DG ENER), Tudor Costantinescu.
“Ports are not just mere goods distribution areas, but strategic hubs in the energy ecosystem of the future, linking production, distribution and consumption in an increasingly sustainable, technologically advanced framework” is the underlying concept behind President Guerrieri’s speech at the opening of the initiative.
Mr. Guerrieri explained that one of the Port Network Authority’s strategic objectives is precisely to pave the way for setting up a real hydrogen value chain, a ‘Hydrogen Valley for the Tuscan coast’, for shipping, logistics and industrial facilities in the North Tyrrhenian area.
From this point of view, the agreement with the port of Damietta responds “to the objective of acquiring a strategic role in setting up hydrogen import system from third countries, with the subsequent creation of infrastructure for its storage, distribution and utilization.”
But why Damietta? The fact is that Egypt is now one of the largest producers of green hydrogen in the world. A supremacy it has been able to acquire by virtue of their great potential for developing electricity from photovoltaics and wind power, which is necessary for electrolysis.
Egypt has now become a major exporting nation. The Port Network Authority’s goal is to turn Livorno and Piombino into European gateways for liquid hydrogen being transported from North Africa.
The two ports are ready to face the challenge. The North Tyrrhenian port network has already been qualified by the international consulting firm Deloitte as a relevant ‘case study’ for developing hydrogen at coastal level.
According to the study that the Deloitte consultancy firm produced for the European Commission, the North Tyrrhenian port network has what it takes to become a key energy import hub in the Mediterranean.
The Memorandum of Understanding sets out in black and white that the Parties will, in particular, commit themselves to organizing joint technical support programmes in the field of green transition and sustainable energy technologies, agreeing that the Memorandum Of Understanding signed today “will form the common basis for the development, submission and support of joint proposals in order to obtain subsidies from European funding programmes’.
Just how much hydrogen can be imported from Egypt is not yet known. The Memorandum will be filled with content over the next few months. The Port Network Authority is going to prepare a feasibility study on a Mediterranean supply chain for green hydrogen. The first results will be announced in November during the European Hydrogen week.
The President of Tuscany Regional Administration, Eugenio Giani, is highly satisfied with the agreement. He believes that the Memorandum of Understanding will give a strong boost to the economic and environmental activities in the ports involved: “Livorno and Piombino have all the right cards to candidate themselves as Italy’s first maritime-port hydrogen valley, focusing on the development of a complete hydrogen supply chain that will have to start from applications that are in some way ready for the energy switch and then focus on longer-term targets, including setting up a of a terminal on Tuscan quays for importing hydrogen (and/or ammonia) by sea,” he said.
Translation by Giles Foster