Neste Oil to build a NExBTL plant in Singapore

30 November 2007

Finland’s Neste Oil plans to invest €550 million in building a plant in Singapore to produce NExBTL renewable diesel. The plant will have a design capacity of 800,000 t/a, making it the world's largest facility producing diesel fuel from renewable feedstocks.

The plant will be based on Neste’s NExBTL technology. The first NExBTL facility was commissioned in Finland at Neste’s Porvoo refinery in summer 2007, and a second is due to come on stream there in 2009.

The main raw material planned for the Singapore plant will be palm oil. Neste Oil has committed itself to only using palm oil certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil as soon as sufficient quantities are available. Palm oil complying with the RSPO certification system, which was approved in November 2007, will probably be available from the early part of 2008 onwards.

The NExBTL technology can produce diesel fuel using any vegetable oil or animal fat as its input. The end-product, NExBTL Renewable Diesel, is a hydrocarbon-based (non-ester) premium-quality fuel that outperforms conventional fossil diesel fuel. Total lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions of NExBTL are 40-60% less than those of conventional diesel fuel, according to Neste.

Source: Neste Oil