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Day two of the Congress began with a regulatory and trends theme. Stephan Baumgartel, Managing Director of VSI took the first session on sustainability in the lubricant manufacturing industry. He made an interesting and valid point about a saw mill located next to a forest whereby if the saw mill was too efficient and took down too many trees then its future was jeopardised if the forest was not sustainable. Sustainability, he argued, has an environmental, economic and social dimension. In Germany friction and corrosion costs the economy approximately 20 billion euros. Corrosion can be identified by the difference between energy inputted into a system and that which is expended, Stephan commented.
In the question and answer session that followed his presentation, Sebastian Crawshaw, Moderator for the event, commented that in ExxonMobil safety became a surrogate for profitability as the safest plants were the most profitable.
Peter Tjan from ATIEL took the next session and talked about changes to the Lubricant Marketer’s Letter of Conformance whereby a charge of 975 euros a year will be levied to support the pan European compliance policy involving the testing of 200 samples of products for a range of properties each year. Compliance is a big issue in the sector and although the majority of lubricant companies are ethical and their products make valid claims, ensuring the ongoing trust of our end users in our products is paramount to our sector.
Innovation in re-refining followed with a session by Christian Hartmann, Managing Director of Puraglobe and President of the European Re-refining association GEIR. Christian talked passionately about the role re-refining plays in sustainability. In Europe 1.2 million tonnes of oil is re-refined annually, and GEIR members account for 65% of this volume. Marco Codognola from Viscolube, a GEIR member, shared the session with Christian and talked about a new innovation in Italy ‘Re-made in Italy’ which will be promoted as a brand for the sector.
Andreea Kaye from the UEIL Secretariat team followed with a session on EU update and taxation, informing the Congress of work UEIL had undertaken on Access to Technical Information and the forthcoming review of the Energy Tax Directive in an interesting session.
The morning coffee break was sponsored by the North American lubricant association ILMA. It was good to see President of ILMA David Groghan and Chief Executive Officer Holly Alfano at the event. The final session of the second day was themed Industry trends. Professor Carlo Andrea Bollino from AIEE, the
60 LUBE MAGAZINE NO.142 DECEMBER 2017
Associazione Italiana Economisti dell’Energia gave a presentation on economic forecasting in the energy and oil markets. Professor Bollino, formerly Chief Economist with ENI, referenced the work AIEE had carried out in support of the UEIL Lubricant Industry Statistics project as an example of their forecasting work.
Milind Phadke from Kline led the next session on global synthetic basestocks. Milind talked about the European market accounting for approximately 20% of the worldwide estimate of demand of 39.6 million tonnes. Of this volume approximately 15% was accounted for by Process Oils and 40% by Passenger Car Motor Oil (PCMO) and Heavy Duty Motor Oil (HDMO). Miklind said that the overall market was flat with little or no growth coming out of recession and even in China where higher growth levels had been expected, these had not been realised recently.
Synthetics had driven the market in established economies with a 30% penetration in Europe compared with around 5 or 6% in Africa and the Middle-East. The drivers of synthetic base stocks were OEM specifications driving initial and service fill, regulators and consumer awareness. Globally basestock demand was averaging at around 35.5 million tonnes of which 10% was used for blending synthetic lubricants. There was approximately 3 to 4 million tonnes of synthetic and semi-synthetic basestock demand in the market. In the PCMO and HDMO market Group II and III base oil was used for greater solubility reasons in the blend.
The market for PAO remains between 620 and 630 thousand tonnes a year. In the high viscosity end there is now surplus capacity and at the low viscosity end not so much surplus capacity. Overall the market is flat as it switches from mineral to semi-synthetic and synthetic stocks.
Valentina Serra-Holm, UEIL President, gave the final closing comments and delegates enjoyed a lunch break sponsored by Temix Oleo.
After the event I enjoyed a tour of Bologna. Most people who visit the city pass through its exceptional transport links en route to Rome, Venice and Napoli. Situated in the north of Italy the city holds a strategic position that supports commerce and economic generation for a city based on a rich cultural heritage and this blend of old and new came together very convincingly as the backdrop for the 2017 UEIL Congress.
LINK
www.ueil.org
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