Singapore to house Neste's biggest renewable products plant

Singapore

FINNISH energy giant Neste will be expanding its existing facility in Tuas, making Singapore the site of the firm's largest renewable products plant. It will account for about half its global production capacity of 4.5 million tonnes annually by 2022.

The company is currently the only one offering renewable diesel on a global basis, according to Neste chief executive officer and president Peter Vanacker. The expansion will increase renewable fuel output from 1 million tonnes per year to 2.3 million, while the plants in the Netherlands and Finland account for the rest of its production capacity. With the new facility, Singapore will also become Neste's first site to produce renewable jet fuel at a commercial scale as the company expands its product slate beyond renewable diesel.

This was announced by Senior Minister and Coordinating Minister for Social Policies Tharman Shanmugaratnam in his speech at Neste's foundation stone ceremony on Wednesday to mark the extension of the new production line. In his speech, Mr Tharman said that the upcoming expansion will create over 100 local jobs, and commended the firm for its commitment and emphasis on training.

"Neste has developed specialised in-house training for their workers to equip them with the necessary skills in its niche technology. These include e-learning and simulated on-site training, as well as sending workers to Neste's sites in Finland and Netherlands," he said. The company is also working towards using lower-quality waste and residues in its process of creating renewable products.

"We are exploring extensively with other companies and other industries to identify these streams, make them commercially viable, and utilise them to replace fossils," said Mr Vanacker.

For instance, innovative capabilities to process dirtier waste animal fat and residual plant oils will be developed in the Singapore facility.

The firm is also looking at ways to introduce liquefied waste plastic as a future raw material for fossil refining.

Mr Tharman said that this increases material efficiency, and reduces crude oil dependency and carbon footprint. The expansion plans also come amid a critical need for innovations to tackle climate change.

"Without innovations to create efficient, affordable and scalable forms of clean energy, the cost to economies and societies of transiting to clean energy will be far higher. It will then be far more difficult to secure the necessary political commitment in any democracy to make that transition," said Mr Tharman.

While most of the demand for Neste's products come from Europe and North America, Mr Vanacker told The Business Times that Singapore is "definitely at the forefront" among countries in the Asia-Pacific, contributing to the choice of the Republic as a development site for Neste.

Among other reasons are high technology as well as good infrastructure and logistics systems.

The expansion follows an investment of S$2.1 billion by Neste. Construction of the expanded plant started earlier this year and is expected to be ready in the first half of 2022.