Creating a circular economy in Washington and along the U.S. West Coast

Mahoney Environmental, a Neste Company, will acquire Washington-based General Biodiesel’s used cooking oil collection business. This is Neste’s and Mahoney’s first entry into Washington and part of a bold ambition to establish a circular economy along the U.S. West Coast that can reduce emissions from transportation, a major contributor to climate change.

General Biodiesel will operate under the Mahoney brand, collecting used cooking oil from local restaurants, hotels, stadiums and other venues with commercial kitchens. Together, Mahoney and Neste will now bring to the table a “one-stop shop” solution to more safely and efficiently manage waste, improve kitchen operations and fight climate change.

“Starting today, we will be turning the used cooking oil from more than 2,000 Washington businesses into renewable fuels that can immediately replace fossil fuels and reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” says Jeremy Baines, President of Neste US. “Once Washington adopts a clean fuel program, we look forward to closing the loop and supplying forward thinking businesses and cities across the Evergreen State with renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel made from locally-sourced waste materials.”

Creating a circular economy is all about sustainably converting waste materials into higher value products. Nearly 51 million pounds of used cooking oil are generated in Washington each year - enough to create more than 5 million gallons of renewable diesel or sustainable aviation fuel. These are drop-in renewable fuels that can immediately reduce greenhouse gas emissions - up to 80% on a life cycle basis compared to fossil fuels.

Neste's circular economy

The circular economy has been shown to help cities and businesses more quickly and affordably achieve their climate goals. The opportunity for Washington is immense. For example, flights out of Seattle-Tacoma International airport could gain access to sustainable aviation fuel made from used cooking oil generated by the airport’s many concessionaires, or fans could come and go from Climate Pledge Arena on buses that run on renewable diesel made from the stadium’s own waste.

Overall, renewable fuels are also essential to creating a carbon neutral transport system. Hard to electrify vehicles and equipment, such as big rigs, planes, marine vessels, emergency response vehicles, generators and many more, are essential to maintaining a high-quality life and powering the economy. For example, fueling commercial vehicles and aircraft with renewable fuels can solve the dual challenge of fighting climate change whilst meeting society’s demand for same day deliveries. A growing challenge as the amount of online purchases keeps growing.

With a clean fuel program, renewable fuels will become widely available and price competitive with fossil fuels in Washington. Recognizing the opportunity, the Port of Seattle, King County are working to accelerate the use of renewable fuels. Additionally, leading Washington businesses - and such as Amazon, Microsoft, Boeing and Alaska Air - have set their own climate goals and shown support for the adoption of a clean fuel program.

Neste can trace all of its renewable products back to the waste materials used to make them, which is what enables the company to provide circular economy solutions. From waste to engines, Neste works to ensure that its entire renewable supply chain respects human rights, does not harm the environment, complies with ethical business practices, and does not compete with our food system. This sustained commitment to safe, responsible, ethical, and now to net zero operations has consistently earned Neste recognition as one of the world’s most sustainable companies.

FAST FACTS

Neste is rapidly growing in the United States. Earlier this year, Neste acquired Illinois-based Mahoney Environmental, began supplying sustainable aviation fuel into California, and more than doubled the size of its network of renewable diesel fueling stations.
Neste is building an end-to-end renewable product value chain, from sourcing waste materials,processing them into renewable products, and finally to distributing the finished products around the world. In principle, this is similar to how large oil and gas companies combined exploration, production and the refining and sales operations to become more efficient and better meet customer needs.
Over the last five years, renewable products made by Neste prevented 38.9 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent from entering the atmosphere - the same climate benefits as installing 7,620 wind turbines or keeping 3.43 billion gallons of crude oil in the ground. Recently, Neste has set an ambitious target for its production operations to be carbon neutral by 2035.