MOSCOW (MRC) -- Private equity firm Cresta Fund Management has agreed to buy a controlling stake in idled Canadian 135,000-barrel-per-day (bpd) Come-by-Chance refinery, a fund representative said, with the aim of converting it to renewable fuels production, reported Reuters.
The refinery, owned by North Atlantic Refining Ltd (NARL), has been idled for more than a year.
Several refiners since then have announced plans to convert their operations to renewable fuels production to remain viable as both Canada and the United States try to reduce carbon emissions.
Canada’s Clean Fuel Standard (CFS) will require carbon-intensity reduction targets set for fuels such as gasoline, diesel and kerosene, starting in 2022 and is projected to increase renewable fuel demand.
The first phase of the conversion would change Come-by-Chance refinery to a facility capable of initially producing 14,000 barrels of sustainable aviation fuel and renewable diesel daily by about mid-2022, said Chris Rozzell, Cresta’s managing partner said in an email.
A second phase will seek to double the capacity of the refinery and incorporate the ability to produce green hydrogen - where renewable energy such as wind or solar powers the extraction of hydrogen - Rozzell said.
The deal is expected to close in the third quarter and the fund declined to disclose the value of the transaction.
We remind that, as MRC informed previously, NOVA Chemicals declared force majeure (FM) on all its polyethylene (PE) resins produced in the Sarnia region of Ontario, Canada, because of mechanical failures, according to the company's letter to its customers as of April 27. The FM did not affect any of its other PE products. The PE plants affected include Mooretown high density polyethylene (HDPE) at 210,000 mt/year, Mooretown low density polyethylene (LDPE) capacity at 170,000 mt/year, and St. Clair HDPE capacity at 209,000 mt/year. The FM was lifted on 14 July, 2021.
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 953,400 tonnes in the first five months of 2021, which virtually corresponded to the same figure a year earlier. High denisty polyethylene (HDPE) shipments decreased.
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