Speech by Jacques Edouard Lévy on the occasion of Belenergia's 15th Anniversary

First of all, thank you, my dear Chairman, for the trust you have shown me over the years.

A company is, first and foremost, a human adventure. Fifteen years at Belenergia, but in reality more than twenty-five years of working together. We have pooled the best of ourselves. Despite our differences, and sometimes thanks to them, we have kept the same course, faced the difficult moments and savoured the successes.

The trust you placed in me has flowed through the whole company. It was passed on from person to person, all the way to the heart of the organisation.

Tonight I feel a particular emotion in recalling our friendship, the friendships that have been formed within Belenergia, and the road we have travelled together, as we mark this anniversary.

I won’t retell the story of Belenergia here. I have written a book on the subject, which we will have the pleasure of sharing with you soon.

Fifteen years is both short and long. It is long enough to have known successes, difficulties and periods of doubt, but also to have seen teams, projects and sometimes whole families grow up around the company. Not to mention my two sons, who have had time to become adults!

We created Belenergia. From a gathering of dynamic men to whom we entrusted heavy responsibilities, a unique company was born, one that, we all believe, is more than the sum of its parts.

We live in a world undergoing deep change, something like a new Renaissance, even if many view this paradigm shift with apprehension.

As I reflected on these fifteen years of history, I asked myself what gives our journey its coherence. Surprisingly, I came back to an old Renaissance idea. The humanists held that the world was organised around four forms of connection: convenience, emulation, analogy and sympathy.

Belenergia is a Franco-Italian adventure that belongs to today’s industry, the circular economy, and meeting our energy needs in a clean way. With hindsight, I believe these four principles tell the story of Belenergia rather well.

First, convenience. In the Renaissance sense, it means creative proximity, not opportunism, although from time to time we have been able to be opportunistic when circumstances demanded it.

Things develop because they touch. Belenergia was born that way: from the meeting of men who shared the same passion for energy, the same taste for projects and the same mutual trust. Our power plants, our teams and our territories came together through proximity, like the links of a single chain.

Next, emulation: the reflection at a distance.

Two distant realities answer each other without ever touching. Over the years, our teams in the former Bourbon kingdom (Apulia, Basilicata, and now Nola and Abruzzo), our teams in northern Italy (Lombardy and Veneto), France and Spain have often worked far from one another. Yet they have developed the same reflexes, the same technical standards and the same entrepreneurial culture. They have recognised themselves in a shared spirit without necessarily having walked the same paths. And we are proud of that: we are all seeking the path to excellence.

Analogy: the third principle is the one we claim as our own, and the one that set us apart from the pure players.

What made us distinctive is not a particular technology but a way of approaching projects. We have never specialised in a single sector. We have looked for structural similarities behind apparent differences. A photovoltaic project, a biomethane unit or, the day after tomorrow, a storage system or a data centre do not have the same content. Yet the form remains: identify an opportunity, raise capital, win over a local community, build a useful asset and manage it for the long term. The technologies are partly different, although in every case we can sell MWh. The method remains.

Sympathy: the force of attraction.

For Renaissance thinkers, certain things were naturally drawn to one another. I believe every lasting company rests on this invisible force. Talent attracts talent. Projects attract partners. Successes attract new ambitions. Trust inspires. What allowed us to grow is not only a strategy or a business plan. It is this ability to bring together different people around a common adventure. And what strikes me, fifteen years on, is that almost everyone who built this story is still here today.

So Belenergia was born from a small circle of closeness, and it has become a force of attraction. If its future is promising, it is not only because we have ambition and expanding markets, but also because we know how to attract those who wish to take this road with us.

So, what is Belenergia today?

A growing group that develops within a healthy ecosystem of partners, in the service of one ambition: to do industry well and properly, just as the Renaissance sought to make the man well and properly, and, we hope, as we still do today. We apply to our industrial trades the same demand for rigour and integrity that the Renaissance applied to the formation of the individual. It is not just about producing energy; it is about doing so cleanly, legitimately and consistently. What does that mean in practice? Producing wealth that is essential to society, above all electricity and biomethane, while respecting the environment. But above all, for fifteen years and for the years ahead: investing always and again in our businesses, seeking synergies and positive externalities wherever we can. And regarding Belenergia as belonging, in a moral sense, as much to its teams and its ecosystem as to its shareholders and its banks. We are fortunate to have financial investors from the sector who are betting on growth and who also know that it is the men and women who, by developing, building and operating, create value for Society with a capital S, and for the company.

Jacques Edouard Lévy is CEO of Belenergia.