Antonio Llardén, Executive Chairman of Enagás, and Marco Alverà, CEO of SNAM, have been awarded the 2019 Tiepolo Prize.
The recognition, granted jointly by the Italian Chamber of Commerce and Industry for Spain (CCIS) and the Spanish Confederation of Business Organisations (CEOE), under the auspices of the Italian Embassy, will be presented in Madrid on 25 November at the Palacio de Amboage, Italy’s diplomatic headquarters, at an event led by Ambassador Stefano Sannino.
This prize recognises the careers of two individuals whose commitment has contributed to strengthening economic relations between Spain and Italy, promoting collaboration between the two countries in international markets and diffusing a highly competitive image of Spanish and Italian production systems throughout the world.
Antonio Llardén is the driving force behind the gas infrastructure that Spain needs to guarantee its energy supply, as well as the initiation of the internationalisation of Enagás.
Antonio Llardén Carratalá (Barcelona, 1951) has served as the Executive Chairman of Enagás since 2007. The company has 50 years of experience in the construction and operation of energy infrastructures, and as a TSO is at the vanguard of efficiency in Europe.
Trained as an industrial engineer at the Technical College of Industrial Engineers at Barcelona’s Polytechnic University of Catalonia, he has extensive experience in the business world. Throughout his career, he has held various positions of high responsibility in the infrastructure and energy sectors, including that as chairman of the gas company Sedigas and a member of the Eurogas Board of Directors and the Executive Committee of the International Gas Union (IGU). In addition, he has served on the boards of several Spanish companies in the sector and in 2007, he chaired the LNG World Congress.
During his time as chairman, Enagás has invested more than 5billion euros in Spain to develop the gas infrastructure network necessary to guarantee supply security and in the back up of renewables in the energy transition process. This network is also equipped to transport and store renewable gases. After completing construction of the necessary Spanish infrastructures and interconnections with neighbouring countries, the company began an internationalisation process. It currently holds shares in Tallgrass Energy, an energy infrastructure company that owns, among other assets, 13,400 km of gas pipelines. It also operates in Mexico, Chile and Peru through different energy infrastructures. Enagás is also participating in the 878-km long Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) project, which will link Turkey to Italy via Greece and Albania. In addition, it is part of the consortium which owns 66% of the Greek gas operator DESFA.
Enagás has positioned itself as a company committed to the energy transition and to the decarbonisation process, promoting innovative projects such as the world’s first LNG-powered passenger train and the European CORE LNGas HIVE project to decarbonise maritime transport. It has also created the subsidiary EnaGasRenovable to promote and develop non-electric renewable energy projects such as those focusing on biomethane and green hydrogen. Its specific projects include Power to Green Hydrogen, other power-to-gas projects, and agreements to promote biomethane and the circular economy.
Enagás has been recognised as the world leader in its sector in sustainability for the fourth consecutive year by the Dow Jones Sustainability Index.
Currently, Llardén is the Chairman of the Foundation for Energy and Environmental Sustainability (Funseam), which is made up of the main companies in the Spanish energy sector; he is also a member of the Executive Commission and Board of Directors of the Spanish Energy Club, of the CEOE Business Action Council, and of the Business Leadership Forum. In 2017, he was named a Knight of the Legion of Honour in France, the highest award granted by the French nation for distinguished merit in the service of the country.
Marco Alverà, architect of the international consolidation and positioning of Snam as a leader of the energy transition at European level.
Marco Alverà (New York, 1975) has been CEO of Snam, one of Europe’s leading energy companies, since 2016.
With a degree in Economics and Philosophy from the London School of Economics, Alverà has worked for almost 20 years in Italy’s most prominent energy companies, dealing with natural gas, electricity and oil. After starting his career at Goldman Sachs in London, he worked at Enel and Wind. In 2005, he joined Eni, where he held managerial positions during his almost 11 years at the company.
Under Alverà’s leadership, Snam has established itself as a leader of the energy transition in Europe, as it was the first company to begin experimenting with hydrogen immission in the gas transport network. Similarly, the Snamtec project has given life to new businesses in sustainable mobility, biomethane infrastructure and energy efficiency. In addition, in recent years, Snam has consolidated its international presence through important strategic operations, including the acquisition of Gas Connect in Austria and its winning bid for 66% of the Greek operator DESFA in consortium with three other major European companies, including Enagás. The acquisition of DESFA will strengthen Greece’s role as an Eastern Mediterranean hub, contributing to the integration of European energy markets. Snam and Enagás are also shareholding partners in the TAP pipeline.
In recent months, Snam became the only Italian company to join the international Zero Coalition for the decarbonisation of maritime transport, and has signed an agreement with the Israel Innovation Authority to develop green economy technologies.
Alverà is also the chairman of GasNaturally, a partnership of six associations representing the European gas sector. He is an independent director of S&P Global, a member of the General Board of the Giorgio Cini Foundation in Venice, and a Visiting Fellow at Oxford University. He is also the author of the book Generation H, published by Mondadori, on the prospect of hydrogen as a clean energy vector for the future.
