Neste delays Porvoo refinery turnaround amid COVID-19 outbreak

Neste Corp. is delaying 11 weeks of routine planned maintenance previously scheduled for second-quarter 2020 at its 10.5 million-tonnes/year refinery in the Kilpilahti industrial area of Porvoo, Finland, as part of the operator’s effort to limit the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Following the government of Finland’s declaration of a state of emergency in the country due to the COVID-19 outbreak, Neste has determined the major turnaround—which occurs every 5 years—will need to be executed in phases, with only the most business-critical maintenance works and regulatory inspections to be executed in the originally scheduled April-June window, the operator said on Mar. 23.

Neste—which must now restart planning of the turnaround as a result of the delay—said it expects to define a new execution schedule for remaining maintenance works and investment projects by the end of third quarter. Those outstanding works and projects, however, will not be completed until 2021, according to the operator.

While Neste estimates negative impact of the turnaround’s now-revised first phase of business-critical maintenance works and regulatory inspections on comparable operating profit presently stands at about €85 million for mainly second-quarter 2020, the company warned that figure could change given the exceptional and ongoing uncertainty created by the current business environment.

Before the newly announced postponement, Neste estimated the scope of the originally planned €450-million Porvoo turnaround to negatively impact its 2020 comparable operating profit by a total of €220 million, according to a Feb. 7 presentation to investors.

Neste—which confirmed in its 2019 annual report the Porvoo refinery carried out of a series of unidentified preliminary activities for the 2020 major turnaround last year—has not disclosed details of specific projects to be executed as part of the postponed maintenance event, which as originally planned was to require more than 6,000 workers to complete.

The turnaround, however, will involve regulatory inspections, maintenance works, and selected asset improvement initiatives aimed at ensuring safety, availability, and competitiveness of the Porvoo refinery for what Neste calls the next operating cycle, according to information available in the operator’s most recent reports to investors and on its website.