The road to becoming fully circular: A tale of two companies

Posted: January 15, 2025

Recently at AVEVA World Paris, two major AVEVA customers delivered presentations about their AVEVA journeys, how they are using our solutions to achieve carbon neutrality, and what benefits they have seen or expect to see. On the surface, their stories might seem quite different; however, they have a lot in common.

Neste: Strategic planning to become carbon neutral

The first presentation was by Neste, the world’s largest producer of renewable diesel and jet fuel.

Neste owns three renewable production facilities that produce diesel and sustainable air fuel in addition to traditional crude oil refining. Its ultimate target is to stop crude oil refining and reach carbon neutral production by 2035. Neste is working to convert traditional units to be able to process renewable and circular feedstocks as well as build completely new facilities. The team used AVEVA™ Unified Supply Chain to support the strategic planning process. The software enabled a thorough analysis of different scenarios of supply and demand changes for different plant modifications over a multi-year period across the supply chain. This allowed Neste to make better decisions about when to execute which transformation project at the Porvoo site—which Neste is transforming into a leading renewable and circular solutions refining hub—to meet renewable targets in time while maximizing margins delivered by each project and by the overall transformation.

Covestro: Intelligent process simulation for more sustainable production

The second presentation was by our long-time AVEVA™ Process Simulation customer, Covestro.

Covestro is a global high-quality polymer manufacturer. These materials are used in various key industries such as automotive and transportation, construction, and electronics.

The company’s vision is to be carbon neutral for operational emissions by 2035 and to become fully climate neutral by 2050. To achieve this, Covestro is turning to more alternative raw materials such as end-of-life products or bio-based feedstocks. This shift requires designing new processes to convert the new feedstocks into products and developing new technologies and processes for innovative recycling. Its engineering team uses AVEVA Process Simulation as a tool for modelling these new processes and predicting new process feasibility from environmental, technological, and economic standpoints, with the goal of creating less energy-intensive methods and saving time. This provides the basis for designing scalable plant processes for the circular economy of the future.

Different phases, one solution: Optimization from process design to plant operations

Neste covers the strategic planning stage of how to achieve sustainability as a business in the presentation. After understanding the “how?” and “when?,” the next question is what plant designs are required to turn a sustainable strategic plan into process design and plant operations. This process design for a circular economy is the focus of Covestro’s presentation. Thus, the two presentations complement each other in addressing the challenges in different phases of the transition to a sustainable and circular economy. No matter what stage your company is at, AVEVA has the industrial software solutions to optimize strategic planning and process design to help combat climate change, transition to a low-carbon economy and become fully circular.