our story
We have been supporting the economic and social growth of communities since 1837: we have led the energy transitions of the last 200 years, improving the environmental sustainability of energy sources every time. From pioneers in the gas industry, today Italgas is an international leading Network Tech Company in the fields of gas, water, energy efficiency and IT, focused on innovation and digitalization.
Birth in Turin
Compagnia di Illuminazione a Gas for the city of Turin is the first Italian company specialized in the production and distribution of "illuminating gas" and represents the embryo of today's Italgas. The production workshop is built outside Porta Nuova: the coal comes from Newcastle.
The company becomes "Italian"
The Lighting Company acquired a share in 1851 on the Turin Stock Exchange. Five years later, it joined the Piedmont company and created the Società Gaz Luce in Turin, unifying the city network. In 1862 it changed its name to Società Italiana per il Gas, thus emphasizing the national dimension.
Latest expansion of illuminating gas
The 80s of the 800 see the take off of electricity, Società Italiana per il Gas and the Edison Company of Milan formed the Italian Società italiana per
l’illuminazione elettrica in 1885. The Italian Electric Lighting Company was founded by Mr. Antonio Mancini, Director of the Italian Gas Company.
Gas for heating homes
In 1902, the gas industry in Turin declared a general strike against the main companies in this sector. In the same years, industry is trying to exploit the calorific value of the gas produced by coal distillation for use in heating and cooking.
Italgas becomes a financial holding
After the First World War, in the new Italgas Group, with President Rinaldo Panzarasa, enters the Società Torinese Industria Gas Elettricità - STIGE: the Group comes to control about forty gas workshops throughout Italy, Becoming an industrial force in gas derivatives.
The crisis of '29 and the arrival of Frassati
The expansion of the Group affects its economic and financial balance. After the crisis of the late 1920s, a recovery phase began under the presidency of Alfredo Frassati, who chose to downsize by liquidating many foreign holdings in the gas industry and concentrating on Turin.
The Second World War
During the conflict, the gas service in Turin and throughout the Centre-North suffers from a lack of raw materials and is severely restricted: the plants suffer numerous damages due to bombing and war. The first experiments with natural gas are also being started.
The methane revolution
Italgas takes the first steps towards the use of natural gas, creating in Lodi the first urban distribution network. In 1950, Italgas had 42 gas outlets operating in large cities: apart from Turin, it operated in Rome, Florence and Venice.
Entry into the ENI Group
Italgas is taken over by Eni, the then Ente Nazionale Idrocarburi. From the 1970s onwards, it became a key player in the country’s methanization. In the 1980s, it formed Italgas Sud, a new entity entrusted with the implementation of the large project for the methanization of southern Italy.
The delisting
In November 2002, Eni launched a takeover bid for all of the shares in Italgas. The following year, after more than a century and a half, Italgas leaves the Milan Stock Exchange.
The partnership with Snam
As part of a corporate reorganisation project, Eni is concentrating its regulated gas activities in Snam. A new Group is born in which the different businesses of the supply chain are present: transport with Snam Rete Gas, storage with Stogit, regasification with GNL Italia and distribution with Italgas.
The spin-off from Snam and back on the stock exchange
In 2016, Italgas and Snam separate their industrial routes. The spin-off coincides with the return to stock exchange of Italgas, which readopts the historic ticker «IG» left thirteen years ago, at the time of delisting wanted by Eni.
The new strategic vision
The company celebrates 180 years of history and gives new impetus to its activities. A new strategic vision based on technological innovation and the digital transformation of networks and processes prelude to the arrival of renewable gases and makes Italgas benchmark in the sector.
Innovation and digitalisation
The drive for innovation does not slow down: the Digital Factory is born. Thanks to smart, intelligent and flexible networks, Italgas aims to contribute to the energy transition for a decarbonized economy. With the acquisition of 100% of Seaside - today Geoside, the Group enters the energy efficiency sector.
The first methane arrives in Sardinia
Two years after the acquisition of Medea, the main operator in gas distribution in Sardinia, the Group begins to distribute the first methane in the only region still unprovided. Thanks to the construction of native digital networks and a new logistics based on a network of small cryogenic LNG deposits, the island boasts a state-of-the-art gas system.
Heritage Lab
The digital transformation involves the entire Group: the Italgas Historical Archive and Museum become Heritage Lab. The project introduces new ways of describing and digitizing documents with the aim of making available to scholars an immense pool of big data from the past.
Bludigit, the Group's IT company, is born
Bludigit concentrates the Group's Information Technology activities and the Digital Factory. Bludigit is the cornerstone of the digital transformation path, with the further objective of developing new synergies within and outside the Group in a service provider logic.
The Group strengthens its presence abroad
Italgas acquires the Greek gas distribution operator through an international tender. The integration process begins with the Greek group that changes its name to Enaon. In italy Italgas concentrates in the new brand Geoside the different realities acquired in the field of energy efficiency.
Commitment to the water sector
Italgas takes over from the French company Veolia the shareholdings in some water service companies in Lazio, Campania and Sicily. It is Acqualatina, Acqua Campania and Siciliacque. Coordination is assigned to Nepta, the new company in the Group where all water activities are concentrated.
A Network Tech Company
With the strengthening in the water sector and the continuous growth in energy efficiency, Italgas completes its evolution towards the form of a Network Tech Company, that is an operator
Which manages gas and water networks, guaranteeing, thanks to technological innovation, increasingly efficient and sustainable services. Today Italgas is an international group, leader in the gas, water, energy efficiency and IT sectors.