Francesco Starace has been appointed President of EURELECTRIC (Union of the Electricity Industry), the association that represents the European electricity industry across the world and unites over 3,500 sector companies from more than thirty countries. Starace, who will remain in office for two years, was elected at the annual EURELECTRIC conference held in Estoril, Portugal. His appointment was "a great honour" for the CEO who promised: "As EURELECTRIC President, I will ensure that the sector's main stakeholders are committed to making the electricity industry the driving force behind European energy policies so that we can face the challenges of the energy transition."
It is a great honour for me to be the new President of EURELECTRIC, an association which establishes the European electricity sector as the leader of the energy transition
Francesco Starace, Enel CEO
Starace tackled such matters in the morning as a guest at the opening conference session focusing on the value of electrification as the driving force behind energy decarbonization in Europe, one of the objectives included in the Paris Climate Agreement to which the European electricity industry has already allocated investments equalling 1,800 billion euros to from 2010 and 2050. The debate attempted to explore the changes which reaching the objective of zero emissions will entail for sector players and the influence that these could possibly have in other areas of the economy. In his address, Francesco Starace underlined how the computerisation of electricity grids and plants was fundamental as "it contributes to promoting the decarbonization process."
"Any plant can produce more efficiently and pollute less if computerised," the new association president added, highlighting that the computerisation of existing electrical plants will make it easier to manage and maintain them in the future.
The new mandate EURELECTRIC has assigned the Enel CEO shall take three lines: promoting an increasingly more frequent use of sustainable policies within association member companies, incentivising the adoption of strategies which accelerate electrification processes, and developing new business models with integrated renewable energies and other solutions directed at environmental sustainability. Francesco Starace knows these principles well and has adopted them as benchmarks for leading Enel. It is no coincidence that Enel too has included the progressive reduction of thermoelectric production from fossil fuels in its Strategic Plan, setting the goal of decarbonising its own energy mix by 2050.
"It is a great honour for me to be the new President of EURELECTRIC, an association which establishes the European electricity sector as the leader of the energy transition"
Enel editorial staff