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The 'Greening' of Motor Oil
By Garrett McKinnon
NOLN Staff Writer
Want to know how the “go green” mindset has found its way into the hearts of most Americans? I’ll share an anecdote. National Oil & Lube News is headquartered in West Texas, a bastion of conservatism. (And we like it that way!) Yet even here, people have realized that we all have an impact on the planet — and we’re doing something about it.
The grocery store at which I shop began offering green synthetic-canvas bags to shoppers last year. They cost you a buck each, but you do get a small discount every time you bring them back. My wife and I were early adopters, but in the past few months I’ve seen more and more shoppers using these bags. Now, it seems like people who opt for “paper or plastic” are in the minority; most of us are using our reusable shopping bags.
What does this anecdote have to say about the fast lube industry? Plenty. Consumers, it seems, are increasingly willing to put their money where their mouths are — even during a recession — when it comes to reducing their environmental impact.
Recycled or re-refined motor oil has been on the market for decades, but within the last year a handful of auto service companies have begun offering re-refined motor oil to their customers — and profiting by doing so.
Barea, Ohio-based Lube Stop began offering the “EcoGuard” oil change last summer using ProGuard ECO re-refined motor oil. Also last summer, Firestone Complete Auto Care shops in the Portland, Oregon, area began offering customers oil changes with EcoPower re-refined motor oil, and expanded the service to the Boston, Massachusetts, area in December. Smaller operations have followed suit, and vendors and industry suppliers are beginning to take notice, as well.
One of the reasons consumers are increasingly receptive to the idea of a recycled motor oil could be that re-refined lubricants have been used in government vehicles for nearly a decade. Executive order 13149 signed by President Bill Clinton in April 2000 mandated that within six months of the order “no federal agency shall purchase, sell or arrange for the purchase of virgin petroleum motor vehicle lubricating oils when re-refined motor vehicle lubricating oils are reasonable available and meet the vehicle manufacturer’s recommended performance standards.” That means for most of the past nine years the majority of government fleet vehicles, including military vehicles, have operated with re-refined motor oil.
Re-refined motor oil is exactly what its name describes. Used motor oil is collected, cleansed, then put through almost the same refining process it went through as virgin crude oil until a base oil is produced. An additives package is mixed with the base oil and, voila — re-refined motor oil, a product almost chemically identical to motor oil made from virgin crude.
“The base oils used in the manufacture of (re-refined) products is produced in a complex, multistep refining process. Third-party refiners collect used oil from service stations, lube shops, fleet maintenance centers and other locations where used oil is gathered,” said Reginald Dias, director of Commercial Products for ConocoPhillips Lubricants. “The used oil is treated in several processing steps to remove the insoluble and solubilized impurities. In the final refining stages it is fractionated by distillation into various viscosity grade cuts and hydrotreated to produce high quality base oil. This re-refined base oil is quite similar to the conventional or virgin base oil in most of its characteristics. Finished lubricants are produced from the re-refined base oil by additization with suitable performance additives. Like products made from conventional base oils, the products made from re-refined base oils are also subjected to the same industry-standard engine tests and bench tests to prove performance and validate their use under a specification or license, such as API CJ or SM, etc.”
ConocoPhillips currently offers a re-refined motor oil under the Firebird brand name. Though mainly used by government agencies that are subject to mandated use of the products, Dias said private consumers who proactively seek environmentally responsible products are turning to the products, as well.
“76 Lubricants (now a ConocoPhillips subsidiary) first launched the Firebird products line in 1994,” Dias said. “The 76 Firebird line promotes environmental responsibility by conservation of natural resources and helping to reduce unregulated disposal of used oil.”
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Five Things You Need to Know
About Re-Refined Motor Oil
1. Mandated for use in government fleet vehicles, including military vehicles, since 2000.
2. Re-refining process produces base oil almost chemically indentical to base oil produced by refining virgin crude.
3. Cost of re-refined motor oil is on par with conventional products.
4. Re-refined oil takes 85 percent less energy to produce than products derived from crude oil.
5. Re-refined lubricants marketed by leading companies meet or exceed API and ILSAC standards for motor oil.
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Currently, ConocoPhillips offers a pair of Firebird motor oils: 76 Firebird Heavy Duty EC 15W-40, a diesel motor oil meeting API CJ-4/SM standards, and 76 Firebird LD Motor Oil, a 10W-30 passenger car motor oil (PCMO) meeting API SM and ILSAC GF-4 standards.
One of the pioneers of re-refined motor oil is Safety-Kleen. From the time the company acquired the BresLube refinery in 1987, the industry’s largest used oil collector has offered re-refined lubricants. Today, the company offers two lines of re-refined lubricants: America’s Choice and EcoPower.
“Safety-Kleen has a broad range of weights and grades, going from 5W-20 to 15W-40 in engine oils,” said Mike Ebert, head of the company’s East Chicago re-refining operations. “Our main focus is expanding our production capacity to meet the demand for our green products.”
And that demand is increasing.
“We are definitely seeing an increased demand for ‘recycled’ products. People actually see recycling as a benefit, and there is a belief — especially in younger generations — that recycled products can be as good or better than ‘virgin’ products,” said Eric Zimmer, vice president of Marketing for Safety-Kleen. “Young people have been around recycling all their lives.”
According to Zimmer, the last two to three years has seen a rapid increase in the demand for re-refined motor oil.
“It’s been fairly consistent across the board, from the do-it-for-me/installed side to large fleet customers to do-it-yourselfers at the retail level,” he said.
The growing demand goes back to those two buzzwords we hear over and over: environmentally friendly.
“There is a lot of demand for environmentally friendly products, especially by younger consumers,” Zimmer said. “Motorists want quality, but they are also actively seeking out environmentally friendly products, and they will pay a premium price for those products.”
Interest in re-refined lubricants may be at an all-time high, with even companies like Shell telling National Oil & Lube News, “We are evaluating opportunities to use re-refined base oils of consistent quality in our products to meet certain finished oil specifications.”
And a company that recently jumped wholeheartedly on the re-refined motor oil bandwagon is North American Lubricants. This independent motor oil manufacturer launched its line of PureGreen re-refined products last fall and, at least early on, has seen great results.
“The response has been tremendous,” said Shane Terry, president of North American Lubricants. “There has been vast interest, and we’re starting to see that interest turn into volume. I’m very excited to see it develop and see what fast lube partners around the country can do with this new service. I think there’s huge potential.”
With products including PureGreen PCMO in weights of 5W-20, 5W-30 and 10W-30, as well as PureGreen Extra Duty 15W-40 (which meets the API CJ-4 specification) and PureGreen Heavy Duty 15W-40 (which meets the older API CI-4 specification), Terry said North American Lubricants introduced the product category for a number of reasons.
“First, simply because of the huge green movement that’s going on in the United States during the last 24 months, a movement that continues to build steam. More and more consumers are looking for a green alternative for all kinds of stuff, whether its printing, dry-cleaning, you name it. The fast lube industry was no different,” Terry said. “The other area that we saw huge potential in from a fast lube standpoint was fleet accounts. Most of the large companies in the United States are doing anything they can to support the green movement. The ‘green’ motor oil product line is ideal for fleet accounts. The second part of that is any municipality that outsources their work, if any fast lube works on state vehicles, city vehicles or county vehicles, many of those municipalities now require, as part of the formal bid process, the use of re-refined motor oils in the vehicles serviced.”
Terry believes the products can benefit fast lubes in several ways, as well.
“One thing I think it does for a fast lube operator is differentiation in the local market. At this point they might be the only facility in town with a green oil change,” he said. “To be the first one out of the box with this new service can be hugely beneficial. I believe local media outlets will pick up the story and run with it. It is a feel-good story that the operator can get some great press out of. They are doing their part in providing some tangible environmental benefits to their community.
“The used oil comes directly from fast lubes. Instead of the cradle-to-grave closed loop system, it’s actually cradle-to-cradle because the product never dies. One of the interesting facets of re-refined motor oil is that the molecules in the oil never go bad. The additive package gets used up, and the oil gets dirty. With re-refined oil, the used oil goes back through the hydro-treating and full refinery process and the base oil comes out the other end in quality equal or greater than base stock coming out of a conventional crude oil refinery.”
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The Greenest Oil?
Few would argue that a truly biodegradable motor oil would be a good thing, as every year in this country more motor oil is improperly disposed of than was spilled in the Exxon Valdez disaster.
Until recently, however, the technology did not exist to turn animal- or vegetable-based oils into a fully functioning motor oil, one capable of meeting the most stringent performance specifications. Now, a company called Green Earth Technologies has found a way to do so.
Using a patent-pending process, Green Earth Technologies is able to take saturated animal fats, whose molecular single-bond carbon chains are similar to petroleum oils, and refine them into a motor oil that not only meets the latest API SM standards, but one that retains its biodegradable nature (and meets the highest biodegradability rankings as determined by ASTM).
The new product is called G-Oil, and is currently available in weights of 5W-20, 5W-30, 10W-30, 10W-40 and straight SAE 30, in both bulk and single-use quantities. According to Dr. Mathew Zuckerman, president and COO of Green Earth Technologies, full API certification and licensing should be earned soon; until then API has granted permission for Green Earth Technologies to market G-Oil as “meeting” API standards.
Green Earth Technologies also touts that its bottled products are made from recycled plastic (minimum 25 percent post-consumer content), and that the labels are printed using water-based inks on recycled paper.
More than being just green, though, the product also protects. G-Oil’s G-1 Racing Oil will even be used by Kinetic Motorsports in their BMW M3 race cars in upcoming Grand-Am Koni Sports Car Challenge races at Daytona and Sebring. According to Zuckerman, in tests G-Oil actually outperformed conventional and synthetic motor oil.
“This is really the first innovation in motor oil since synthetics were introduced in the 1950s,” Zuckerman said. “Consumers aren’t giving up anything in terms of price, performance or protection. It’s the first time a green product is as good or better than a conventional product.”
For more information, visit: www.getg.com
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In addition to market differentiation, re-refined motor oil may be able to help operators where they live — at the bottom line. According to Tom Morley, president of Lube Stop, the chain currently sells the EcoGuard re-refined oil change service to nearly 40 percent of its customers, at a price $2 higher than that of an oil change using a conventional oil.
The best part about such an arrangement, according to Terry, is that the extra income is all profit.
“The cost of goods for re-refined products is basically that of conventional motor oil. The price is about a wash. The bay time does not change, and their overhead costs do not change, so operators getting a small up-charge for a ‘green’ oil change see that extra margin go straight to the bottom line.”
At an industry average car count of 34 per day per facility, selling re-refined oil changes to 40 percent of customers means an extra $8,000 or more added to the bottom line each year.
Marketing the product to consumers shouldn’t be difficult, either, given re-refined motor oils’ many environmental benefits.
“Number one, if used oil is not re-refined it is normally turned into a bunker fuel that is burned in ships overseas or in heaters or various industrial applications. That burn-off creates air pollution. So, air pollution is reduced because the oil is not burned in inefficient ships and industrial burners. The second problem with such an application is that once the used oil is burned, it’s gone. It can no longer be reused. So when oil is re-refined, you’re literally using that gallon of oil over and over and over again without sacrificing any type of product quality, and you’re conserving literally irreplaceable petroleum resources,” Terry said. “Two, it is a self-sufficient system. Should the green oil change movement really take off we will be considerably reducing our reliance on foreign crude oil.
“Finally, if the oil collected at the fast lube facility is put back through the re-refining process, that oil is not improperly disposed of. It does not end up in a landfill or in a waterway somewhere in the United States. The environmental integrity stays intact with that oil over and over again.”
Plus, consumers don’t have to sacrifice when it comes to product quality, according to Terry.
“The consumer is getting a product that is equal or greater in quality than a conventional motor oil,” he said. “The product is licensed and approved with API and ILSAC and meets current OEM specifications. So you’re getting equal performance, you’re getting environmental benefits and great quick lube benefits. It’s really a win-win-win all the way around. That’s why I see extreme potential for these products.”
With operators across the country looking for ways to stay ahead in a tough economy, helping customers meet their need to be “green” just might be the edge they were looking for.
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