Italy’s government has given the go-ahead for two new floating storage and regasification units to be installed in the country, as part of Rome’s plan to cut its reliance on gas imports.

Minister of Ecological Transition Roberto Cingolani told parliament on Tuesday, “Today we officially mandated Snam to negotiate the acquisition of an FSRU and the leasing of a second,” Reuters reported.

Two FSRU vessels, with a combined capacity of more than 10 billion cubic metres will be located in the Tyrrhenian Sea and Adriatic Sea close to existing pipeline infrastructure, according to an earlier Reuters report.

The decision to boost the country’s LNG import infrastructure came just days after Eni chief executive Claudio Descalzi outlined plans for the company to access some 14 trillion cubic feet of gas in the short and near term that could be fed to Italian markets.

In particular, he identified North Africa, including Algeria, as having the potential to boost piped gas supplies to Italy.

Stay a step ahead with the Upstream News app
Read high quality news and insight on the oil and gas business and its energy transition on-the-go. The News app offers you more control over your Upstream reading experience than any other platform.