Edison (EDNn.MI) aims to nearly double its core earnings by 2030 with an accelerated roll out of renewables and hopes to restart producing nuclear energy by 2040, the Italian energy group said.
In its strategy plan, the Italian subsidiary of France's EDF said it was targeting earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of between 2 billion euros and 2.2 billion euros ($2.10 billion-$2.31 billion) in 2030 from 1.1 billion euros last year.
To reach the goal, the 140-year-old group plans to invest 10 billion euros, half of which will be to develop renewable energy.
In the long term, the group hopes that Italy will lift its ban on nuclear energy, allowing it to set up two power stations using small modular reactor (SMR) technology.
"The new nuclear and the carbon capture technologies will help us meet the target of a complete decarbonisation of our business by 2050," Edison CEO Nicola Monti said during a presentation in Milan.
According to the group's estimates, Italy could save some 400 billion euros investment by decarbonising its economy with renewable energy sources and a small portion of nuclear energy by 2050.
Italy banned nuclear energy after it was rejected in a national referendum in 1987 and another in 2011.
Monti acknowledged that the return to nuclear power would be a difficult and long path.
In its plan to 2030, Edison said that power generation from renewables would account for more than 45% of the group's core earnings at the end of the decade, with natural gas and thermo-electric power accounting for 30% and services to customers covering the rest.
The group aims to produce 5 gigawatt (GW) of energy through renewables by 2030.
Edison wants to remain an important gas supplier for Italy but plans to use new technologies, including carbon capture to completely decarbonise its businesses by 2050.
Monti said the group had launched a market test on the sale of its gas storage division, a business that could have a value of more than 700 million euros, he said.
