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MOSCOW (MRC) -- Finnish renewable
diesel producer Neste has announced plans to close its refinery operations in
Naantali, Finland, as the demand for fossil oil products drops, said the
company.
In September, the company revealed plans to restructure its
refinery operations in Porvoo and Naantali to enhance the competitiveness of the
oil products business. Neste has now has decided to shut down its Naantali
operations by the end of March next year. following the finalisation of the
co-operation negotiations.
According to the company, the COVID-19
pandemic has accelerated the fall in demand for oil products and is not expected
to recover to previous levels. It will now focus on the terminal and harbour
operations at the Naantali refinery and will also renew its operating model for
its oil products.
As part of the new plans, Neste’s Porvoo refinery will
be transformed to co-process renewable and circular raw materials. Neste
president and CEO Peter Vanacker said: “We want to improve our competitiveness
and maintain refining operations and related strategic capabilities in
Finland.
“The changes will support the transformation of the Porvoo refinery into a
leading sustainable, safe, and efficient refinery, enabled by our highly
innovative and efficient Neste people.” The restructuring process is expected to
result in annual fixed cost savings of nearly EUR50m for Neste and the
termination of approximately 370 positions.
However, the redundancies are
lower that the previous estimate of 470, when the restructuring plans for its
refinery operations were announced. Neste procurement, HSSEQ and human resources
senior vice president Hannele Jakosuo-Jansson said: “As part of our
transformation, we will also renew the Oil Products operating model.
“As
a consequence, some of the jobs will cease to exist but completely new jobs will
also be created. In the co-operation negotiations, we agreed on comprehensive
change support measures which will help our personnel in adapting to the
change."
As MRC informed earlier,
Royal DSM, a global science-based company in Nutrition, Health and Sustainable
Living, has announced that it will start a strategic partnership with Neste, the
world’s leading producer of renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel and a
forerunner as provider of renewable and circular solutions for the chemical
industry, to enable the production of high performance polymers.
As MRC
informed
earlier, in September, 2020, DSM formed a 50/50 joint venture (JV) with VDL
Groep (Eindhoven, Netherlands), called Dutch PPE Solutions, to produce medical
facemasks and establish the first permanent production of critical facemask
components in the Netherlands. The companies are investing several million euros
to purchase manufacturing equipment and build manufacturing facilities to
produce meltblown polypropylene (PP), the critical material layer in medical
facemasks that filters viruses, and make medical masks.
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, PP
shipments to the Russian market reached 880,130 tonnes in the nine months of
2020 (calculated using the formula: production minus exports plus imports,
excluding producers' inventories as of 1 January, 2020). Supply increased
exclusively of PP random copolymer. |
