MOSCOW (MRC) -- Neste and LyondellBasell has recently announced a long-term commercial agreement under which LyondellBasell will source Neste RE, a feedstock from Neste that has been produced from 100% renewable feedstock from bio-based sources, such as waste and residue oils and fats, as per Neste's press release.
This feedstock will be processed through the cracker at LyondellBasell’s Wesseling, Germany, plant into polymers and sold under the CirculenRenew brand name.
Through their collaboration, Neste and LyondellBasell are jointly contributing to the development of the European market for more sustainable polymers and chemicals solutions. By ensuring continuity with significant industrial-scale volumes of renewable polymers produced with renewable feedstock from bio-based sources, the companies wish to enable sustainability-focused brands to develop more sustainable products and offerings.
In April 2021, LyondellBasell launched the Circulen family of products. LyondellBasell’s CirculenRenew product line consist of polymers linked to renewable-based feedstocks, while polymers made from mechanically recycled materials are marketed under the brand name CirculenRecover and those linked to advanced (molecular) recycling are called CirculenRevive.
As MRC reported earlier, in late June 2021, the scheduled maintenance i.e. the major turnaround at Neste’s Porvoo refinery in Finland was successfully completed and production started at the refinery. The major turnaround is a significant investment to secure safety, availability and competitiveness of the refinery. The total investment of the Porvoo refinery major turnaround was approximately EUR630 million, of which approximately EUR 330 million was realized in the major turnaround in 2021. In 2020, only the most critical maintenance work was executed at the refinery as the corona pandemic delayed the turnaround by a year.
Ethylene and propylene are the main feedstocks for the production of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), respectively.
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 744,130 tonnes in the first four month of 2021, up by 4% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. At the same time, PP deliveries to the Russian market were 523,900 tonnes in January-April 2021, up by 55% year on year. Supply of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased, whereas shipments of PP random copolymers decreased.
Neste (Helsinki) creates solutions for combating climate change and accelerating a shift to a circular economy. The company refines waste, residues and innovative raw materials into renewable fuels and sustainable feedstock for plastics and other materials. The company is the world’s leading producer of renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel, developing chemical recycling to combat the plastic waste challenge. In 2020, Neste's revenue stood at EUR 11.8 billion, with 94% of the company’s comparable operating profit coming from renewable products.
LyondellBasell is one of the world's largest polypropylene producers, a leading supplier of polyethylene and catalysts, and a developer of polyethylene and polypropylene technologies. The company manufactures products at 58 production sites in 18 countries around the world. In addition, LyondellBasell is the developer of the Spheripol process, which is the basis for polypropylene production at Omsk Poliom and Nizhnekamskneftekhim.
MRC