direct/ Neste Oil Corporation (FI) - NESTE OIL WELCOMES STRICT SUSTAINABILITY CRITERIA FOR BIOFUELS

The European Commission to propose a directive on the promotion of the use of energy from renewable sources

Neste Oil welcomes the transport biofuels targets and the strict environmental sustainability criteria for biofuels proposed by the European Commission. Neste Oil agrees that no feedstocks should be permitted if obtained from high-biodiversity land (forest with no significant human intervention) or land with high carbon stock (e.g tropical wetlands).

Neste Oil´s own NExBTL renewable diesel will conform to the sustainability criteria proposed by the Commission. It is the world´s cleanest diesel and has the potential to use a wide variety of feedstock. Neste Oil continues to develop its next generation fuel technology that can also use alternative non-edible feedstocks such as wood chip.

"We believe that high standards of sustainability are essential to the long term success of the renewable fuels industry. Renewable fuels made from sustainable feedstocks can make an important contribution to reducing transport CO2 emissions," says Mr Risto Rinne, President and CEO of Neste Oil Corporation.

"Bio-feedstock producers, producing countries and users should work towards enforceable rules that simply make unsustainable biofuels production bad business. Sustainability should create the basis for profitable business operations in biofuels. These ideas should be built into legislation. The European Commission´s proposal is a positive move towards this direction," added Mr Rinne.

Neste Oil is committed to continue working with a wide group of stakeholders in order to ensure sustainability practices and standards over the entire life cycle of NExBTL renewable diesel production.

Neste Oil is pleased to see that the Commission held to the targets for increasing the usage of biofuels in the EU countries. The EU´s leadership has helped to drive standards up globally.

However, Neste Oil believes that the proposal does not yet achieve technology neutrality for biofuels. The EU should evaluate technologies and feedstocks based on sound science, ie. on their efficiency and greenhouse gas balance. The EU should keep the door open to technologies and feedstocks which do not even exist today to encourage further innovation.

Climate change is a global problem and needs global solutions. To meet its targets, Europe will need feedstocks and biofuels which are produced outside Europe.

"All in all, it is reassuring that the debate is entering a more mature stage and some of the ´silver bullet´ hype is being displaced by a more sober assessment that there will be good and bad biofuels", said Mr Rinne.

NESTE OIL CORPORATION

Osmo Kammonen
Senior Vice President, Communications

Further information:

Jarmo Honkamaa, Deputy CEO, Neste Oil, +358 10 458 4758
Simo Honkanen, Vice President, Biodiesel Division, Neste Oil, +358 50 458 4170

About Neste Oil

Neste Oil Corporation is a refining and marketing company focused on advanced, clean traffic fuels, with a strategy that prioritizes growing its refining and premium-quality renewable diesel businesses. Neste Oil´s refineries are located at Porvoo and Naantali in Finland, and have a total refining capacity of approx. 250,000 bbl/d. The company employs around 4,800 people and its shares are listed on the Nordic Exchange Helsinki. For further information, see http://www.nesteoil.com

About NExBTL

NExBTL, produced by Neste Oil, is the cleanest renewable diesel fuel available today. It offers significant reductions in both greenhouse gas emissions and pollution compared to fossil diesel fuel. The precise reductions in greenhouse gases depend on the raw materials used in production. Tests have shown NExBTL to produce 40-60% less CO2 throughout the whole product lifecycle. NExBTL can be used in any blend, and it does not require modifications to the existing vehicle pool. It can also be used 100% without blending.

This release was published on openPR.