A five-week maintenance shutdown to start at Neste Oil´s Naantali refinery on 31 August

Neste Oil Corporation   
Press Release
24 August 2006 at 1:30 p.m. EET

Neste Oil’s Naantali refinery will see a planned five-week maintenance shutdown in September. The shutting down of the refinery’s process units will begin on 31 August, and maintenance and repair work will start roughly a week later. The special-product refinery is expected to be back in normal operation in mid-October.

The shutdown is intended to secure the operational reliability, performance, and safety of the refinery over the next six years.

The refinery’s energy efficiency and sulfur recovery capacity will be enhanced during the shutdown, both of which will improve the site’s environmental performance. Statutory pressure vessel inspections will also be carried out, and a new flaring system commissioned.

In addition to the refinery’s own workforce of some 400 people, the shutdown will also involve around 1,000 contractor personnel. All of these have been given special safety training for the shutdown to minimize the possibility of accidents.

Neste Oil indicated in its interim report for the second quarter that the shutdown at Naantali will reduce the Group's operating profit by EUR 10–20 million.

The shutdown will be the largest in Naantali’s history, and follows the previous one carried out in spring 2000.

Neste Oil Corporation
Osmo Kammonen
Senior Vice President

For further information, please contact:
Ove Sundström, Vice President, Naantali refinery, on +358 10 45811

Neste Oil Corporation is a Northern European oil refining and marketing company, with a focus on advanced, clean traffic fuels. Neste Oil's refineries are located in Porvoo and Naantali in Finland, and have a total refining capacity of approx. 250,000 bbl/d. The company employs around 4,600 people. Neste Oil is listed on the Helsinki Stock Exchange (symbol: NES1V). For further information, see www.nesteoil.com.