The Future of Lubricants A Recruiter’s View
Keeley Robinson, Oil Recruitment
Advances in electric car technology pose huge questions for the lubricants and additives industry. Paired with the cessation of petrol and diesel vehicle manufacture in 2020, the industry faces new challenges. The Oil Recruitment team recently hosted an event at Tesla Motors in Knutsford where we discussed the future of lubricants as well as getting out on the roads.
Lubricants aside, a walk round the showroom with Tesla is fascinating. The Tesla team showed us the chassis – which has no crumple zone as there is no engine, and under the bonnet – which is an empty space. A vehicle with fewer than 20 moving parts, servicing is a non-necessity and of course the need for lubricants is far less. The ideal forum for a discussion with our industry contacts about the future of lubricants.
Of particular interest to our audience was leaning about new developments in battery technology (one of our guests is in the lithium industry) and the potential to create energy from Tesla’s solar roof tiles. Tesla is investing heavily in battery technology and researching alternatives to lithium for its car batteries, though what exactly they plan to use remains under wraps.
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The future of lubricants in automotive Tesla put 80,000 cars on the road in 2016 and despite year-on-year growth, the market for electric cars remains relatively small. Despite developments in battery technology and commitments from governments about the use of petrol, Facts Global Energy predicts that the majority of the world’s cars will remain powered by petrol for at least the next 20 years. The energy consultancy estimates that only 10% of passenger vehicles will be electric cars by 2040.
McKinsey reports that in 2015, 52% of world lubricant demand (totalling about 9 million metric tonnes) came from the automotive industry. 21% of this demand was light engine oil. Wheel bearing and chassis grease, transmission fluid and gear oil made up the rest of the majority
LUBE MAGAZINE NO.142 DECEMBER 2017
of automotive lubricant demand (Antonio Perlangeli, McKinsey Energy Insights, September 2017).
According to Cuneyt Kazokoglu, writing in the Financial Times (17th March 2017), last year Ford sold six F-series light trucks in the US for every plug-in vehicle and in China, one in every three cars sold is a petrol SUV. With major key markets so reliant on traditional fuels, change is happening more slowly than some analysts predicated.
What clients are saying
So what does that mean for lubricants specialists? Oil Recruitment have a dedicated team for lubricants and speciality chemicals and this is a hot topic amongst our clients and candidates.
From my career in the lubricants industry
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